You Are Not
by aesirborn
Summary: Armin Arlert grew up poor in a dead end world, and doesn't need any of your pity, thank you very much. But when he meets the powerful Eren Jaeger one night at work, everything about his life is thrown into free fall. Armin holds desperately onto his own independence and values as Eren becomes enamored with him, but can he hang onto who he is as Eren tries to hand him the world?
1. Prologue

Armin was tired, down to his bones, but he had another four hours to go. Going straight from his shift at the clothes factory to the bar was hard, and there was some sort of exhaustion permanently ground into his bones by now.

Marco was bar tending, and he looked at Armin with some sort of merciful expression as he set the tray down on the edge of the bar, by a few drinks that Connie had to come pick up. "Some guy walked in the back," he said softly to Armin. "Table 23."

Armin sighed. "Got it," and walked towards the back of the floor, his feet aching. Three hours and fifty-eight minutes to go. The man seated looked old from a distance, but he sat alone, and as Armin got closer, he realized that he was very young, with longer dark brown hair and eyes that were such a lovely shade of green they had to have been dyed. "Good evening," Armin greeted as the man looked up at him. He looked pretty drunk already, with a pleasant blush on his cheeks and a slightly far off look in his eyes. "I'm Armin," he said. "Can I get you anything?"

The man looked at him for a laboriously long minute, before saying, "your name."

Armin bit his lip, and said, "Oh, I'm Armin!" he said in an upbeat tone as if he hadn't just introduced himself a minute earlier, "but I meant, can I get you anything to drink?"

"Eren," the man said, and Armin furrowed his brow in confusion, before the man said, "Eren. That's my name. I want a gin and tonic."

"Got it," Armin said, scribbling it down just in case on his little pad. "I'll be back with that in a few minutes."

He checked on a couple other tables before making his way back into the bar, requesting the drink from Marco and punching it into the customer's bill on the computer. The bar was busy that evening, crammed with people making too much noise. Armin picked up a few empties off of the bar for Marco, taking them into the tiny kitchen to be washed, bringing out a shrimp cocktail that one of his customers had ordered 10 minutes before. He brought the shrimp out to customer, before getting back to the bar and finding the drink sitting on the mat. Sasha was chattering to Marco instead of doing her job, but that wasn't really Armin's problem, so he picked up the drink and set it on one of the less sticky trays and brought it out to the man—Eren.

Eren's head was in his arms, and Armin mused that perhaps he'd already a bit too much to drink as he looked at him, and maybe Armin should escort him to a taxi. But instead, he set the drink on the table, and said, "Anything else, sir?"

"Call me Eren," Eren said.

Armin said, "Anything else, Eren?"

"No," Eren said, his fingers curling a little around the neck of the little glass as he stared at it. "This is just fine," he said calmly.

"Alright, I'll be around," Armin said, getting back to work.

Armin continued his shift. He checked on Eren every fifteen minutes or so, and found that Eren was making very slow progress with his drink, and spent most of his time staring off into space. He asked him if he needed anything else, and Eren would say no. There were more interesting customers, sure—One of Armin's next door neighbors, Reiner, had tried to convince Armin to sit down with him and his roommate and in the process had spilled beer all over Armin's black pants, and another customer tried to tell him all about his ex-wife as Armin picked up several empty glasses from he and his friend's table.

Two and a half hours from his bed, Eren asked Armin to bring over the check, so Armin did so. Armin kind of wished Sasha or Connie had gotten this table, because it required exactly the lack of effort they were sort of famous for and it definitely wasn't going to put much in his pocket. He set the black book on the table and whisked away Eren's empty glass.

Two hours and twenty minutes from his bed, Armin walked over to find the table empty, Eren gone. He picked up a rag and got ready to clean it up, picking up the book first. He glanced in it, realizing that for the six dollar drink, Eren had left a fifty—and a piece of paper, that had the word "Jaeger" written on it, and an address. Reading it, Armin realized two things.

Eren Jaeger was the son of Grisha Jaeger, who had recently passed away and owned the factory Armin worked at—and the address was located in the richest district of the city.

* * *

**A/N: Originally submitted to AO3 on 12-29-2013**


	2. Good Morning

Eren woke up to ice. More specifically, he was lying on his stomach in bed, around one in the afternoon, when Mikasa shoved a handful of ice cubes beneath his shirt, sending them sliding down his back. Eren yelped, jumping up out of bed.

Instead of Mikasa looking at him and laughing like she used to when she did this to him when they were kids, he saw Mikasa frowning at him with deep disapproval.

"You know you're late?" she said sternly.

"To what?" Eren yawned, rubbing his eyes a little and looking around the room. His head hurt something fierce.

"To your meeting with the advisors," Mikasa said. Eren winced.

"Please stop yelling," he said.

"I'm not yelling," Mikasa said, "but if you don't get up, I will be." Eren groaned, and Mikasa grabbed his wrists and pulled him up to be sitting up straight. "If you're not up in five minutes," Mikasa said, "You're gonna regret it."

* * *

Armin got up the next morning and yawned, stretching in bed. His tips from the night before sat on the dresser, and they were outrageous—thanks to that one damn tip. Forty four dollars—although it'd turned into thirty six after he had tipped everybody out. It was still a whole lot from one single—relatively effortless table.

It felt a little bit too early to be waking up, but he had to. He got out of bed and took a shower, wincing as the water ran cold and just wouldn't warm up. He needed a different apartment, he thought.

All of his breakfast food was going sort of stale, but Armin wasn't one to waste food, so he ate tasteless bread and sipped thin coffee, keeping an eye on the time as he sat and stared at his book on the table. It was battered and beaten, his grandmother's old vacation guide, talking about places like Costa Rica and Cuba, with pictures of glittering blue water and white sandy beaches.

The rivers in and out of the city were brown, and the skies were gray. Armin knew there were places in the world that weren't ruined, but sometimes he couldn't believe what was true.

Finally, he finished his food and slipped on his galoshes and buttoned his coat up, slipping out into the corridor. He walked down the stairs and outside the tenement house on swift feet, and started on the path up to the clothes and textiles factory where he worked a sewing machine.

The streets around him were full of gloomy eyed people who had no escape in sight, but Armin refused to let himself think like them. He felt like them, sometimes, but he wasn't one.

Armin looked at the newsstands as he passed by, as he always did. "IMPEACHMENT TRIALS CONTINUE", one read. Another; "OIL SPILL WORSENS IN INDIAN OCEAN" and other such headlines decorated the newspapers. But one another caught his eye. "JAEGER OUT—ACKERMAN IN?" and Armin had to fight his urge to buy it, just because of what he saw the night before.

* * *

Eren hated these stupid meetings. Sat around the table with his favorite person in the world, and some others he didn't care about, with uncomfortable unforgiving chairs and floor to ceiling windows that only showed off how very smoggy the air was each day.

There was actually a pollution warning today, calling all commuters to be wearing filtration masks, but most of the poor flitting about on the streets below weren't wearing them, probably because they didn't know or didn't own any masks.

His head pounded, and Mikasa had laughed at him, and had whisked away the whiskey when he'd tried to pour a shot that morning at breakfast.

"We'd be through this a lot faster, Eren, if we didn't have to tell you to lift up your head every five minutes," Levi said, staring at Eren.

Eren lifted his head, and blinked tiredly. "Sorry," he said.

"This is exactly the sort of reason why we're considering pulling you from your position," Levi said, "At least Miss Ackerman is presentable every morning."

"Let's not discuss that now, Levi," Erwin broke in, passing a manila folder across the table towards Eren. Eren stared at it once it bumped again his arm, opening it a lot more slowly than need be. "Here is the results of the public opinion survey of the company since your father's death, Eren," Erwin said, "and as you can see, they aren't very... good."

Eren looked at the papers for a moment before the things on them started to turn into words. Charts and quotes and figures, and words like "disgraceful", "poor management", and "disappointing" popping into his head. Most of it, it seemed, seemed to be about him.

"I didn't want the company," Eren said, "It was Grisha who went and handed it to me, instead of Mikasa. She's a lot better for the job anyway."

"I don't want it either!" Mikasa said angrily, "Also, in case you've forgotten, I can't own the company, because I'm not _really _Grisha's son!"

"Well," Hanji broke in, reading the mood and deciding that she didn't like it, "You can inherit the company, Mikasa," she said, "but we, the board of advisors, have to make that decision ourselves, and with sufficient legal evidence of Eren's belligerence towards the company," she said. "And, well, there's no belligerence in Eren's actions so far," she went on, "just a complete lack of effort."

"So, if I make an order to produce ten thousand cases of tipless condoms, I'll be out of this dumb job?" Eren said hopefully.

"No," said Erwin, "because we aren't going to let that order be sent out."

Eren groaned, letting his head fall into his arms again.

Levi glared at Eren, and said, "Let him go. Nothing's getting through his hard head to go, we're wasting everybody's time in here."

So, the meeting was adjourned, and once again, a whole lot of nothing had gotten accomplished. Levi, Hanji, and Erwin went back to their usual desk work, and Eren and Mikasa took a cab out towards the shopping center in midtown.

"You should really go home and start some of that paperwork," Mikasa had said when they arrived, "you might actually make the lot of them happy on Wednesday, then."

"No," said Eren, "I'm here to watch you shop until you drop." The problem was, Mikasa didn't do a whole lot of droppping money or energy on shopping trips—she went into every store and tried everything on, only to discover she didn't like it. For a girl of her status, Mikasa had a very small wardrobe, and her accessories were mostly limited to a pair of stud earrings and a threadbare scarf Eren had given her when her parents died, and she was sent to live with Eren's father, as he was her godfather.

The people around them were people like them—children of CEOs and senators, doctors and scientists. Normal people didn't get to shop for new, expensive things, after all, because most of them were struggling to pay their rents.

Eren still felt horrible, and sitting in public probably wasn't a great idea, but going home somehow sounded worse. They wandered around the mall for awhile, and then the rest of the shopping district, and every time Eren began to walk a little too close to the liquor stores Mikasa would pull him away, until it was getting dark outside, and the two realized it was about time to get going home.

* * *

When Armin had started his shift, he knew to expect some kind of attack from Sasha and Connie, but it surprised him anyways. They hadn't quite opened the door to the general public yet, and as he and Marco had stood by the bar polishing glasses Armin almost dropped one because Sasha decided it was a perfect time to jump up from behind him and wrap her arms around his neck.

He'd shouted in surprise, and Sasha had grinned and let go, before saying, "So, who was that guy that left you that big fat tip last night?"

"That was nobody," Armin said, "just some strange, rich drunk," he said.

"Oh come on," Connie said from somewhere behind him, "there had to be something more interesting going on than that."

"Well," Armin conceded, "he scribbled down an address on a piece of paper, too," he said. "It was too a house in Sina Heights."

"_Sina?_" Connie said, "No way!"

"He was probably just being generous," Marco intercepted, "People do do nice things for others sometimes."

"Sina?" Sasha said, stuck on the same thing as Connie, "we need to go check it out, c'mon Armin, you need to still have the address!"

"I think I stuffed it in my book," Armin said, pulling out his green book from his apron and looking it over. "I did," he said, seeing the piece of paper tucked where he normally held onto the bar's copy of the receipts.

"What is it?" Connie asked, peeking over Armin's shoulder as Armin snapped his book shut.

"98 Rue South, Sina Heights, Fort Maria." Armin said quickly.

"Ooh," Sasha said, "got it memorized already? Has Armin got an interest in a rich boy?" Which Armin decided didn't even deserve an answer.

"We should go there," Connie said, "and check out just what kind of place this guy lives in."

"We shouldn't go there," Armin said, "and just let this guys drunken mistakes leave him be."

"That's boring!" Sasha whined, "Come on, Armin, I could totally get us over the fence. Admit it, it'd be fun!"

They opened the bar, and let the customers in, but Sasha and Connie wouldn't drop it for their entire shift. Whenever they encountered Armin as they would meet at the bar to pick drinks or were walking away from nearby tables, they'd whisper, "Come on, lets go to Sina, come on," in his ear, until it made Armin barely want to speak with them at all anymore.

"Fine," he gave in around midnight, "I'll go with you."

An hour and a half later, the bar was closed up for the night and Marco had laughed good naturedly at them as the trio departed, on a bus towards Sina Heights.

The group was dropped off in front of a development half a mile from Sina Heights, and the walk towards that district was even to make Armin feel dead on his feet. This wasn't a good idea at all, he mused, and he kind of felt like dying where he stood, or maybe just sleeping instead.

However, it was better here than in the main part of the city to walk. There was a sidewalk along the sides of the road, and every few hundred feet a street light illuminated the way, until they hit the wall that seperated Sina Heights from the world.

The fence was fifteen feet tall, spiked, and in some areas, electrified, and Armin suddenly felt a little bit afraid.

"Don't wimp out now," Sasha started, staring up at the fence like a challenge, "this is the best part," she said.

"How do we know if this section is active or not?" Armin said.

"We don't, really," Sasha said, walking over and touching the metal calmly. Armin let out a yelp as she did this, and Connie did to, but Sasha just grinned, and said, "it's fine, see!" and pulled a section of rope out of her purse.

"Where did you get that?" Connie asked, dumbfounded as Sasha threw it up over the fence, a loop catching on one of the metal points.

"I found it in the restaurant kitchen, and decided to take it," Sasha said happily, already several feet about the ground and climbing steadily.

"I can't believe you stole from the bar," Armin groaned, and Connie grabbed onto the rope and started to climb.

Sasha was over the fence relatively quickly, grabbing onto a tree branch and climbing down the tree to safety, Connie not far behind.

Armin, however, took longer, and his hands still hurt from rope burn, and his head hurt even more when he though of how much trouble they could get into for doing this, and he found himself wondering how he had ever gotten coerced into this.

Finally, though, Armin made it over, and he felt like he was about to die where he stood. "What was the address, again?" Sasha asked as they walked out and sat on the curb in front of some house.

"98 Rue South," Armin repeated, in a dead voice.

"Guess we gotta walk till we find it," Sasha said, and the walk took even longer. Armin felt very happy that tomorrow was his only day off for the week.

Armin wasn't sure how long they walked before they reached Rue South, but when they did they had to walk down another three or four blocks before they finally found 98 Rue South.

The condo wasn't really much of a condo at all—it seemed enormous, with three floors and probably one of the biggest houses in the entire complex.

"He is rich," Connie breathed out.

"Marry him," Sasha said at about the same time, "and remember to shower your old friend Sasha with a lot of gifts."

Armin took out a piece of paper, and borrowed tape from Sasha's purse. He scribbled on the paper, using the porch as a surface, "_Shouldn't give your address to stranges. Arlert_" and taped it to the door.

* * *

**A/N: Originally submitted to AO3 on 12-30-2013.**

**Original author's notes:**

**Hello everyone!**

**I just want to thank everybody who has read this far already. I hope you enjoy my story.**

**This is my first time writing for this fandom, and I am really sorry if my characterization is shaky! It has been awhile since I watched the anime, but I am reading through the manga now.**

**This AU is a modified version of the 'verse of a short story I wrote called Bottles . Eren and Armin are extremely modified versions of the characters Christian and Helena in that story, and this story will not contain nearly the level of body modification discussed in that one. (Link likely broken, [slash]books[slash]668409-Bottles)**

**Chapters will usually be around 1500-2000 words, I estimate, and I will try to release a chapter every two weeks, but every week will be my ideal. Thanks.**


	3. The Canvas in the Closet

"Eren, you have to wake up," Mikasa was saying somewhere above him. He didn't feel nearly as horrible as he had the day before, but getting out of bed was still not on the top of his list. "Eren, Titania's son is coming over today."

That got him up. Sure enough, he was sitting right up, whispering, "That fucker." Mikasa chuckled and set the glass full of ice on Eren's night stand.

"Um, by the way, I found this on the front door this morning?" Mikasa said, holding out a slightly crumpled piece of paper that looked like whoever had written on it had greasy fingers. "Shouldn't give your address to strangers. Arlert," Mikasa read off it, raising an eyebrow at Eren.

Eren grabbed the paper, and read it over, taking in the neat, narrow handwriting. It all came back to him somehow, how horrible he felt as he walked into that bar, the smoke that seemed to rise from the air, and the cute waiter with the circles under his eyes. "Armin... Arlert?" Eren said to himself quietly.

"What was that?" Mikasa asked.

"Nothing," Eren said, "Go away."

Mikasa glowered, but seeing as Eren was awake and seemed to have something on his mind, she stepped out and let him be. Eren tried to rub the sleep out of his eyes, and reached over to his nightstand, picking up his tablet, and typed in, "Armin Arlert".

It didn't seem like a common name, he thought, as he looked through the results, but this person didn't seem to have any personal profiles. His name appeared several times on honor roll lists from five or more years ago, and in some local articles.

However, one stood out to him, an obituary. He clicked in to one of the local newspapers, seeing the obituary was published about two years ago.

_Ronald Arlert, 67, died Tuesday, due to the gas leak in the work room at Eoten Inc. He was born February 14__th__, 2017, to Elodie Arlert (née Roy) and Jack Arlert. He graduated from Maria High School in 2035. He married Winifred Arlert (née Jones) in 2036. He was a long-time employee of Eoten Inc. Arlert's death was preceded by Elodie Arlert in 2058, Jack Arlert in 2061, Winifred Arlert in 2064, his brother James in 2065, his son William in 2069, and his daughter-in-law Sara in 2069. He is survived by his grandson, Armin Arlert._

"Eren! I have food ready!" Mikasa yelled from somewhere below, and Eren sighed and threw the tablet aside, hoisting himself off of the bed and down the stairs.

Mikasa placed a plate of eggs before him and a glass of milk, and said, "So, what's up with that note?"

Eren took a bite of food as she sat down, and then said, "I guess I gave our address to a cute waiter at a cocktail bar," he said softly.

"You what?" Mikasa exclaimed.

"I was drunk, okay!"

"Eren, he could break in, he could leak where we live to the press—he could leak where we live to Eoten! Oh, god, Eren, what did you do?!"

"Mikasa! Calm down," Eren said as Mikasa seemed to get herself steadily angrier, "We can't do anything now, and we can't get any farther. I already found some information on the guy, 'cause I already knew his first name."

"What of it?" Mikasa asked.

"He was on honor roll in high school, and his parents are dead," Eren said calmly.

"Wow," Mikasa said, "informative, like where he works and where he lives, and what he's certified in."

"He probably lives in Shinganshina district," Eren said, "because that's where the bar was."

"You went to Shinganshina?" Mikasa said, shaking her head. "Eren, you know how dangerous that district is? What where you doing there?"

"Cheap booze," Eren said with a shrug.

"Don't say this stuff around Titania's son, I'd probably die," Mikasa sighed, whisking away the plates even though Eren still had a few bites on his and placed them in the sink. She glanced at the analog clock, and said, "he's gonna be here any minute, probably."

Eren groaned. "I don't want him to come over."

"Business prospects," Mikasa said, "if you wanna keep rivaling Eoten, Jean and his family are damn good engineers, and we want them."

And as Mikasa said that, the door bell rang. They both got up and walked into the foyer, Mikasa opening the door while Eren hung back.

"Hi," Jean greeted, smiling at Mikasa as she waved him in.

"Hello," Mikasa said in turn, shutting the door behind him and drawing the shade over the window cut in the door.

"Eren," Jean said to him, and Eren sighed, uncrossing his arms and staring at him.

"Come on in," Mikasa said, "we can talk in the living room today, alright?"

"Of course," Jean said with a sparkling smile, "lead the way. It's been a while."

"I'll let Eren," Mikasa said, "I'll just go get us some coffee, alright?"

Eren sighed again, turning his shoulder sharply and stalking down the hallway towards the living room. Once they got in, he waved Jean towards the arm chair, and they sat in prickly silence until Mikasa came in with a coffee pot and three filled mugs which she set down gingerly on the coffee table and passed around.

"How are you guys?" Jean asked as he took a sip of coffee. "It's been a while since I've seen you, purely socially, at least."

"We're fine," Mikasa said, at the same time Eren was saying, "why do you care?"

"I apologize for him," Mikasa sighed.

"Don't worry about it," Jean said with a smile, "You're still broken up about Grisha's death, aren't you, Eren? It's been a while, though."

Eren's skin crawled as Eren said that, but he bit down on his lip. Their rivalry didn't even feel worth it anymore, and it hadn't for a long time. Eren remembered when he first met Jean at engineering school—Jean had just been in it for the money, all along, and for some reason, Jean made Eren's skin crawl, even though there was a hundred other kids like him in the class.

The problem was, Grisha, after seeing Jean's work, was enamored with him, and immediately hired his family onto the engineering firm in Jaeger Groups, so even after Eren had quit engineering school, he had to see him all the time.

Mikasa and Jean chatted for awhile about their recent progress (Mikasa had finished engineering school, unlike Eren), and Eren tuned them out, pouring himself another cup of coffee and staring at the wall.

At some point, Jean brought up the topic of Eoten Inc. "They're giving my mother an offer," he said calmly. "They want her on their engineering team."

Eren narrowed his eyes. "Why is it worth mentioning? If they offer her a pay, then we'll up the one she get's from us."

"I was just mentioning it," Jean said. "I thought you might find it amusing that anyone in my family would ever work for them, is all. I know you have that ridiculous thing with them."

However, this did not bristle the conversation anymore in the long run than any normal conversation between Eren and Jean as they sat around in the living room. Eren watched the clock tick by, and kept wishing that Jean would leave.

"Eren," Jean asked, "Have you started painting again?"

Eren threw his coffee mug on the floor and walked away.

* * *

"Disgusting," somebody was saying. "I thought we were far enough from downtown to get away from brats like this."

Armin blinked his eyes open slowly and looked around, noticing a blonde woman with a nasty scowl staring at him and a tall man trying to shoo her away. His neck hurt like hell, a cricking forming in it, and he felt really cold.

He was in a bus shelter, and he, Sasha, and Connie were all lying on top of each other in some weird conglomerate on the bench. He had his head nestled into Connie's neck, and Connie was half him and half on Sasha, who was halfway to falling on the ground. The woman scoffed at him one more time as he jostled the other two awake.

"Oh," Connie said, "Ow, that hurts. Jeez."

"Oh no," Sasha said, rubbing her eyes and noticing how bright the sun was in the sky. "I guess I'm late for work."

"When does the next bus get here?" Connie asked the blonde woman innocently.

"Five minutes," the man next to her said, adjusting his hat and looking away from the trio. His disapproval was less evident, but it still radiated from him.

"Guess we'll take that home," Armin said, getting off the bench and stretching. Ow, ow, everything hurt. His shoulder was sore from where it had pressed into the glass, there was that crick in his neck, and his ass hurt.

If there was a god, he'd be taking a hot shower when he finally got back to his apartment.

They rode the bus home, and when Armin got back he snuggled up with his electric blanket and tried not to wonder if giving someone like that his last name was a good idea or not.

* * *

The comment about painting had set Eren off. His painting had been a sensitive topic, even when he was actually doing it, but now it was like setting some dial in his brain to explode.

He stalked up to his bedroom, throwing open the spare closet doors and staring at the easel and canvas covered in a sheet, which he hadn't touched since his mother died, covered in dust. He ripped the sheet off, dust scattering in the air, and stared at the half finished painting of the ocean. Overwhelmed by emotion, he ripped the canvas off of his easel and threw it on the floor.

He stuck his foot through it, breaking it straight through, and started to rip at the site of the breach, until it hurt his fingers and instead he took to kicking about, frustrated.

The door to his room opened, and he could see Mikasa standing there, with Jean stood behind her. "Eren, calm down," Mikasa said, staring at him.

"Go away!" Eren shouted. "Get out of here!"

Mikasa looked worried for a moment, and finally shut the door, and Eren could hear her apologize through the wall, "I'm sorry, Jean..."

He threw himself on his bed, trying to clear his mind and figure out what he was feeling, but his fingers found the tablet instead, and as he turned it on, he found himself staring at the company files.

Armin wouldn't be working at that bar if he had a real job, right? Somehow, Eren found himself curious, and he switched out of the browser and into the company files, tapping in a search, "Armin Arlert".

An employee file came up, and he quickly opened it, getting frustrating when it took it's sweet time to load, finally pulling up a picture of the waiter he'd seen before. His hair was a bit shorter and his face was a bit rounder, but it was definitely the same person. Position: Machine operator. Pay: $4.35/hr.

Eren grinned, realizing that know he had this person's address, too.

* * *

**A/N: Originally submitted to AO3 on 12-31-2013.**

**Original story notes: **

**Eoten Inc. is, indeed, a reference to Titans, and Eren reallllyyyyy hates Eoten Inc. "Eoten" is an alternate anglicized spelling of "jötunn". I typed "Titan Inc." at first, and laughed, because it sounded stupid.**

**I really hope Armin and Jean's family don't have any accepted fanon/canon names, because I just fucked that all to hell.**

**This fic now has a tag on tumblr "fic: you are not" if anyone is interested.**


	4. The Interruption

Armin wiped the sweat off his brow quickly, trying to get back to work. His fingers ached as he ran the machine, pumping it along with his foot like there wasn't any electricity in the world.

The fabric beneath his hands was soft, but it was cheap, and would surely rip within a few uses by whosoever ended up owning it. As he finished stitching one shirt, he picked up the next from his pile.

The air in this room felt heated and heavy, like it was sitting on him. The lighting was dim and the room was humid, and he couldn't even check the time to see how much longer he would be sitting here, before he went off to work at the bar, which was, admittedly, at least a little bit more fulfilling.

Another shirt he threw on the finished pile to be processed. It was far too hot in here. Sweat dripped down his neck. The manager at the bar was going to yell at him for being dirty again today, he thought bitterly as he stopped for a second to switch feet.

Armin didn't notice, although many around him did, that the doors to the work room had opened, a couple tall men peeking in and speaking with another man, clad in a suit.

"He's in there," one was saying, "at machine 27. Do you see him?"

Armin did notice when a large hand gripped the back of his collar and forced his concentration from his work. He yelled as the force pulled the cloth to dig into his skin.

"Don't do that to him," someone was saying, "they want to see him 'cause they like him."

"You gotta admit," the person who had grabbed him said, "it's kind of amusing when they get all yelling like that."

"You're hopeless," the first said, before turning to Armin, and addressing him for the first time as if he had just noticed him, "Hey, kid, the higher ups are wanting to see you."

"What, me?" Armin said, disbelief painted over his features. "You're kidding, right?"

"Not kidding," the second said, finally letting go of Armin, who spluttered and jumped off his stool, quickly gaining his balance These two people were much taller than him. "They wanna see you, so we're going to bring you to 'em."

"Are, are you sure it's me?" Armin said, "and not somebody else? I still have my work here, you see..." he trailed off.

"Yeah, it's you," the first said, "come on."

They led him out then, not bothering to make conversation. The first one had taken an iron grip on Armin's wrist once they left the work room, and Armin didn't recognize the halls they walked down. All he knew was that the building was progressively getting nicer, and brighter, with more windows, and that he was getting more scared.

They dropped him off with a man who was even shorter than Armin was, who looked at Armin like he was absolute trash. Armin immediately shrunk in on himself, lurching his shoulders forward and staring at the ground. He didn't like this at all.

"Tch," the short man scowled, glaring at Armin. "Jaeger shows up here on time for the first time in weeks, only to request someone like you?"

Armin said nothing, but his blood ran cold as the short man showed him further along the building. He said nothing as the industrial flooring turned to marble tile, and the man's shoes clicked loudly on it.

They stopped at a wooden door, which the man knocked on slowly, and turned to Armin and said, "here we are. Aren't you going to say anything at all?"

Armin shook his head as the door opened, freezing when he found himself staring at Eren Jaeger, again. He was going to kill Sasha and Connie. Eren looked better put together this time, a lot less drunk and a lot more focused. "Thank you, Levi," Eren said calmly, and the man narrowed his eyes and turned away. "Come in, Armin," Eren said to Armin, and Armin couldn't do anything besides that, padding in softly and wishing he could somehow disappear.

The office was luxurious, and now looking at Eren, something about him just dripped and exuded money. His hair looked clean and soft, his skin looked soft and clear, his clothes were well made and expensive. The furniture around them was made of wood and metal and soft, plush cushions, and the floor to ceiling windows showed Armin that he was a lot higher up than he had realized before.

Armin was utterly terrified, as Eren stood there and raked his eyes over him. "You're Armin Arlert," Eren said softly.

"Um, yes," Armin said, "I am, could you please explain?"

Eren stepped closer, reaching his hand out to touch Armin's hair. "You're still really cute, aren't you?" he said, nudging closer.

"Please, please don't touch me," Armin said, grabbing Eren's hand and pulling it away from his hair. "What do you want?"

"To know you," Eren said, dropping his hand and stepping a bit further away. This wasn't going as Eren had planned. Armin was dirty and he sort of smelled, and he looked completely terrified by everything in this room. What had happened to the suave cocktail waiter at the bar? "Can I take you somewhere?" Eren asked.

Armin stiffened. "Well, ah, you could take me back to my work, I really ought to get back to it, I need the money, you see-"

"I'll take care of it," Eren interrupted, sitting down on one of the chairs. "Sit," he said to Armin, pointing at one opposite him.

Armin sat down gingerly on the plush affair, as if he was afraid he might ruin it. "Um, why me?" Armin asked, "Out of all the people in the world, why me?" he realized he had to be careful with his words. Even though this whole mess was scaring him, Eren was still his employer, and he had to be polite and respectful, even though everything that was happening made him want to get up and run away even more.

"I'm not sure, really," Eren said, "there's just something about you that stands out to me." He pressed some button on the arm of his chair, and looked at Armin again, some sort of fire burning in his arms. "Tell me about yourself, Armin," Eren said.

"Well, ah-h," Armin stammered. "I'm twenty-three years old and I've lived in Shinganshina my whole life, I work at a sewing machine here and I also wait tables at a bar, and u-um," he stammered, looking down and away.

"I already know that," Eren said, "tell me something I don't know. Tell me something you want."

Armin searched his mind for something to say to Eren, and he finally said, "I want to go to the caribbean, and see the water," he said, "Where its clean. I always wanted to."

"I could take you to the caribbean," Eren said as soon as Armin had finished speaking, "I could probably have you there by next week."

"Oh no!" Armin protested, crossing his arms over his chest and trying to look away. "I could never have you pay for something like that for me. I could never have anyone buy something like that for me with a clear conscience."

"It really wouldn't be a trouble," Eren said, but he stopped speaking as the door opened and another employee walked in with a tray of sandwiches and potato chips. Eren nodded as the employee walked back out, leaving the tray on the coffee table. "Eat something," Eren said to Armin.

"Oh, no, thank you," Armin denied quickly, waving his hands.

"I said eat something," Eren said, and Armin raised his eyebrows and grabbed a couple of potato chips from the tray, mourning his choice as they crunched when he bit into them.

"Um, I'm sorry about going to your house," Armin said softly. "The others uh, they pushed me into it, but I swear we aren't going to do anything with your address, okay?"

"No," said Eren, "It's fine, and I trust that you won't do anything with it," Eren continued, "I can tell that you're not that kind of person."

"Eh, thanks?" Armin said, trying not to flinch as Eren stared straight at him again. "Are your eyes real?" he blurted out, suddenly looking right at Eren.

Eren blinked, but then again, the question wasn't one that he hadn't heard before. Usually, he heard it from tittering rich girls, but it was still a fact that the inquiry wasn't new to him. "Yes, they are," Eren said. "I've never gotten any body mods."

"Oh," Armin said. "Well, uh, they're really nice."

"Thank you, Armin," Eren said. "You know, you haven't been holding up my request very well," Eren said, his voice suddenly playful.

"What do you mean?" Armin asked.

"I asked you to call me Eren, the other night at the bar," Eren said, and Armin flinched again. "I really wish you would stop doing that," Eren said.

"I'm sorry," Armin said. "Eren."

"Thank you," Eren said, and suddenly wanted to kick himself for his awkwardness, so instead he took the plunge. "Do you want to see my house? The inside, I mean. And you can meet Mikasa."

Armin took a moment to process the information, before nodding and saying, "...if you insist?"

Eren lead Armin out of the building then, and hailed a cab, piling into the back seat with him and barking the address at the driver. Eren stared at Armin for a few minutes as the driver started to drive, but found himself without things to say. "Don't be worried if Mikasa scares you," Eren suddenly said, as the topic popped into his mind. "She just likes to intimidate people, that's all."

"Oh, o-okay?" Armin said, folding his hands in his lap and staring out the window. "I guess I'll keep that in mind," he said.

No matter how Eren tried to start conversation, it would fiddle out, and Eren kept cursing at himself as he saw how awkward and afraid Armin was. It wasn't supposed to be like this. Eren was supposed to be smooth and charming, Armin kind and witty, and Armin was supposed to be all over him. That was what Eren had wanted. Instead, the waiter and seamster looked as if he was just searching for the nearest excuse to be jumping out of the car.

The cabby dropped them off outside of the house and quickly drove away, and the two padded up the steps. Eren unlocked the door and let himself inside with an old fashioned key, shutting the door behind Armin. "Take your shoes off," he said.

As Armin unlaced his boots, a low, feminine voice shouted, "Eren, is that you? What are you doing back so-" they stopped. Armin looked up, and locked eyes with a dark haired girl about Eren's height, and flinched. "Oh," the girl said.

"Mikasa, this is Armin. Arlert." Eren said calmly.

"Oh, so this is who you're so obsessed with," Mikasa said, stepping closer and staring at Armin again, her expression plain. "I'm so sorry," she said to Armin.

"Uh, it's fine?" Armin said, unsure how to react as the two engaged in a staring contest with each other. He just wanted to go home.

"Do you mind?" Mikasa said, grabbing Eren's arm, "we're just going to step aside for a moment."

Armin shook his head no, but it didn't matter because Mikasa was already dragging Eren away again.

"What are you doing?" Mikasa whispered fiercely, glancing towards the foyer again. "The kid looks scared out of his mind!"

"I don't know!" Eren said, pulling a little away. "I'm trying to be nice but he just shuts down everything I say!"

"Apologize to him, and take him home then!" Mikasa said, "If you like him, then why don't you act normal instead of showing off all your money this whole time and pulling the kid away from his work?"

"Alright, fine," Eren said, jerking away form Mikasa and walking back towards the foyer. Armin was still standing there, staring at a painting on the wall. Eren's heart lurched at the sight of it.

"Who painted this?" Armin asked innocently, looking at Eren with an different, friendlier face.

"Um," Eren hesitated. "I did. A few years ago."

Armin looked astonished, stepping away from the painting and looking at Eren with some kind of new respect. "Wow," Armin said, "you must have worked very hard to create something like this. It's beautiful."

Eren blushed, but he smiled at Armin a bit. "Thank you," he said softly, unable to look at the piece himself. "I haven't painted in a long time though."

"Why?"

"It hurts," Eren said, and Armin dropped the subject, but he still kept stealing glances at the painting. "Look," Eren said, "I should probably apologize. None of this is fair to you. I'm sorry for dragging you away from your work and scaring you like this."

"Oh, ah-" Armin said, still unable to quite put his words together.

"I should take you home," Eren said.

"Yeah, um, I'd like that," Armin said, glancing at his toes.

Eren called a driver, a real driver, and tipped him off to take Armin home in the luxury vehicle. He figured that the boy need his space. Inside, he was still cursing.

But at the same time, he was trying to come up with excuses to go to that bar again.

* * *

**A/N: Originally submitted to AO3 on 12-31-2013.**

**Original story notes omitted.**


	5. Reflection

Armin felt exhausted when he got back to his apartment, even though normally he wouldn't be out of his job at the factory for another hour and a half. Where would his pay for today go? Armin needed it, he needed every cent. Eren said he would take care of it, but could Armin trust him?

Armin decided to take the opportunity to take a shower before going to his shift at the bar that evening. Amazingly, as he stepped under the shower head, hot water actually came out. It felt amazing—Armin couldn't quite dig up his last memory of a hot shower, and even after he finished scrubbing he just stood under the stream for five minutes until the hot water ran out.

Stepping out and wrapping up under a towel, Armin thought that maybe today wasn't such a bad day after all.

He dried himself off and pulled on clean clothes for his shift at the bar, taking extra minutes to fix his hair and to scrub thoroughly at the dirt under his nails at the sink faucet. He felt the cleanest that he had in days, and he grinned widely at the still foggy mirror.

He made himself a light dinner and brewed another cup of coffee, because even though the shower had refreshed him the hot water had made him feel a little drowsy. He sipped his coffee and nibbled at his sandwich, flipping through the vacation guide lazily as he sat as his kitchen table.

He tried to remember what he did for fun. Was there anything? It seemed like for the past five years all he did was work to survive, coming home and falling right back asleep. His days off were dedicated to sleep, and chores—cleaning up his home a bit and buying groceries and replacing what had been broken. Over the past two years he'd slowly and slowly cut more and more bills out of his life. First to go had been the TV and internet bill—Armin realized that he never actually sat down and watched his tiny little 20" screen, so he'd sold that to a thrift shop and canceled the service, and the internet service was canceled after his laptop had died and there was no funds to possibly replace it. His cell phone and land line bills had quickly followed, because as his friends from his school drifted away there was no point in the stupid device, and once his grandfather died and he downsized apartments, the land line was gone.

There was a point in time, he remembered, when he wanted to save money so he could go to college and buy a house. He did not know where that time went. It probably went like his wages had slowly been going—down the drain.

He got out of his chair and laced up his sneakers, happy to be wearing something that was easier to work in. He decided he'd rather show up to work and get some more things done, so somebody else wouldn't need to—all of this reflection on his life was making him feel terrible.

Walking towards the bar, he reflected on his day. Eren was ridiculously wealthy, and Armin figured that if he chose to he could probably get a lot of things out of Eren's pocket. Gold and diamonds, fancy electronics and designer clothes. Eren was lucky that Armin wasn't that sort of person, if he was going to jerk people he liked around and offer to buy them things like he had.

Armin just hoped that he hadn't somehow ended up as Eren's charity case.

"Armin!" Marco greeted as Armin let himself into the bar. Marco was the owner's nephew, and he was usually the very first one there, meticulously polishing his glasses or reorganizing the liquor. "You're early," Marco said.

"Hi Marco," Armin greeted, locking the door behind himself. "There was an accident in the work room today," he lied, "so I got to go early."

"Oh, are you alright?" Marco said, worry knitting into his features as he hung a glass on the rack.

Armin picked up a rag off the bar and set to polishing Marco's freshly washed glasses. "Oh, yeah," Armin said, "it was really more of a false alarm than an accident. They thought one of the machines was malfunctioning, so they sent everyone home." Armin didn't really like to lie, but if he mentioned it to Marco it'd get mentioned to Connie and Sasha, and then Armin would be hearing all about it for the rest of the year.

The others arrived and they opened up shop, and it was just another normal night. Armin wasn't picking up much for tips, but he was still attentive to all of his tables and smiled at everyone, even the ones who were obviously too out of it to care.

He didn't notice the pair that walked in around nine thirty.

* * *

"Hey, Eren, you look angrier than usual," Jean was saying as he drove them towards downtown. Eren tried to put together exactly how it'd ended up being Jean that he was going Armin-watching with, but he couldn't.

Eren needed more friends, he realized. "It's nothing," Eren grumbled, looking out the window of the plush vehicle. Jean had had a hand in designing this model himself, and he was ridiculously proud of it, and showed it off every chance he could, usually to Eren.

"So, why are we going to some seedy bar downtown?" Jean asked, glancing at Eren again.

"Keep your eyes on the road," Eren barked, and said, "there's just someone there that I need an excuse to see."

"Ah, is it a waitress?" Jean asked with a half-hearted smile. "Or, knowing you, a waiter." Eren muttered something under his breath. "Everybody knows, Eren," Jean said, punctuating every syllable.

The rest of the car ride was tense, and Jean parked outside the bar about half a block down. "So," Jean said, "Are we actually getting drunk, or are we just stalking?"

"I'm not getting drunk," Eren said angling his body a bit away from Jean.

"That's a first," Jean said, which Eren didn't dignify with a response. "Well, then, I'm taking the opportunity to get roaringly drunk and flirt with random people, and have you drive me home." Jean pushed a bit harder. "I hope you're paying."

"Whatever," Eren said, and then grudgingly, "thanks for giving me an excuse."

They pushed through the door into the bar, which was crowded but not full. "Let's pick that table," Eren said, pointing out the table he'd sat at before, which was mercifully empty.

The air was heavy with smoke and the lighting was dim, and Jean found himself wrinkling his nose. "Are you sure you like someone who spends so much time here?" he said, not bothering to check his volume as they sat down.

After a moment, a person walked over, but Eren was irritated to find out that the person was exactly who he didn't want to see, as in, anyone who wasn't Armin. It was a different waitress, with reddish brown hair who seemed to dance on her feet. "Hi!" she greeted, smiling at them. "My name's Sasha, and I'll be helping you out tonight, but feel free to just go straight up to the bar whenever you like!" she said, "Can I get you anything to start."

They placed orders, and as Sasha sashayed away, Jean wiggled his eyebrows. "So it is a waitress," he said.

"Shut up, that's not her," Eren muttered, craning his head to look around the bar. "He's over there," Eren said, nudging his shoulder towards a table on the other side of the room, where Armin stood, laughing and writing down some orders.

"That's still a waitress," Jean said smugly, and Eren reached across the table to whack him hard on the forearm as Sasha came back, baring beers.

"Here you are," she said, setting them down, "wave me over if you need anything."

She walked back over to the bar and ducked in the employee closet, stuffing a handful of greasy potato chips into her mouth. At the same moment, Armin walked in to pick up the handheld vacuum cleaner, and the hand broom and bin. "Your boyfriend is here," Sasha hummed, "the one that tipped you fifty bucks."

"He actually tipped me forty four, and I only got thirty six of it," Armin said, shutting the door as he walked out. Sasha shrugged and ate another handful of tips.

Armin cleaned up the broken glass quickly, soothing the hysterical woman who had dropped her glass. "It's fine, it's fine," he said, "it happens all the time, don't worry about it!" Armin carefully extracted the woman with the runny mascara from himself and dragged the cleaning products away, telling himself that he was certainly not seeing Eren staring right at him.

Twenty minutes later, Armin walked over to the bar to pick up some drinks to find Marco compromised. He was engrossed in conversation with the guy with the undercut that Eren had been sitting with, looking positively enthralled. "Hey, Armin," Sasha said as Armin balanced his tray. "Will you bring table nineteen their chips and dips?" she said, gesturing at the platter. "I'm kind of busy," she went on, glancing at her phone, the tell-tale beeps of the latest hot game coming out of the tinny speakers.

"Sure," Armin said with a frown as he realized it was Eren who was sitting at table nineteen, now alone, abandoned by his undercut friend. He dropped off the drinks and picked up the snack platter, Sasha not even looking up from her phone.

He walked down carefully towards table nineteen, setting the platter down on the table with a smile. "Here you are, sir," he said coolly.

Eren frowned. "How many times must I tell you to call me Eren?" he glanced up at the bar. "Do you get a break?" he asked, eating a single chip.

"I do," Armin said, "but Sasha's breaking right now."

"Come here when she's not," Eren said.

Armin walked away, and Eren smiled, about the same time Jean walked back. "Guess who just got a number?" Jean said with a grin, waving a receipt covered in sharpie in his hand.

"What was that about liking somebody who spends so much time in here earlier?" Eren bit back as Jean sat down and dug into the snack food.

They past the time for a while, both of them spending more time staring at their respective targets than speaking with each other, until Armin walked back to the table, looking a bit bashful. "Hey," he said. "I'll, uh, grab a chair," he said, immediately looking around to try and find one to grab, but he couldn't find one in the immediate vicinity.

"Nah, you'll clog up the traffic," Jean said with a wink to Eren.

Eren took the hint, and said, "Here, coming sit with me," Eren said. Armin looked a bit quizzical, but he stepped closer, and Eren wrapped his arms around Armin's waist and pulled the smaller man into his lap, wresting his chin on his shoulder with a grin.

Armin yelped, but accepted his fate, reaching forward and eating a few of the chips as Eren's grip on him tightened. "So, Armin," Jean said, "you've got my Eren here head over heels."

"Eat shit, Jean," Eren said lazily. "Armin, this is Jean Kirschtein. Don't believe a single thing that comes out of his stupid mouth."

"Harsh," Jean said, "So tell me about Marco."

"Ehh?" Armin said, happy that he didn't at least have to refer to Jean as "undercut" to himself anymore. "Well, um, Marco's uncle owns the place but he's in line to inherit it, you see," he said, "He's taking morning classes so he can be an elementary school teacher," he said, "I think he'd rather sell the bar whenever he get its."

"Working man, I see," Jean said with a smile.

"Go flirt more," Eren said, "he's mine." Armin suddenly felt a lot more uncomfortable at those words, and started to scoot a bit in Eren's lap, trying to wiggle his way out of Eren's hard tight grip. "No," Eren whined, "stay." he said, extending the word out.

"Eren, you can't even pretend you're drunk," Armin said, picking at Eren's fingers on his stomach.

"No," Eren said with a smile, smelling Armin's hair, (which smelled kind of like slightly sour industrial soap) "I just like you, that's all."

"Eren, you don't wanna get involved with someone like me," said Armin, "I'm not worth your time. I'm nothing."

"And I'm a mess," Eren said, "we've both got rough edges."

"Eren, I should get back to work," Armin said, pulling off Eren's hand and standing up. Jean had watched the whole exchange silently, and only raised his eyebrows now.

"Armin," said Eren pleadingly. "Let me make a better impression," he whined.

"Fine," Armin said after a moment. "Take me out on a date. I'm free in four days." Eren grinned. "_But,_" Armin stressed, "I'm paying half."

* * *

**A/N: Originally submitted on 1-2-2014.**

**Original story notes: "and as Sasha sashayed away" is the most glorious phrase I've ever written.**


	6. Residual Fears

The longest day of Eren's life passed, and he still had a few to go. He settled into monotony, and Mikasa was so stunned to find him sitting at the dining room table actually doing his paper work the next night that she dropped the mug she'd been holding.

"What are you doing?" she asked, looking at the shattered glass on the floor, instead of at Eren.

"Work," he said calmly, looking up from the form, "do you have a problem with that?" he countered, pushing his reading glasses up on his nose. He softened. "These make me feel old."

"Nothing wrong with reading glasses," Mikasa said. "Most people wear them after getting the pigment injections."

"I've never had pigment injections," Eren said irritably, pulling the glasses off and setting them on the table. He could think later about how fast his moods could change.

"I know," Mikasa said, subconsciously stepping a bit further from Eren. "I was just saying." She looked at the mess of paperwork on the table again, and her shoulders slumped. "That kid really is having quite an effect on you," she said.

"What do you mean?" Eren said.

"You want to be better for him," Mikasa said, "Just keep that in check, okay?"

Mikasa cleaned up the broken mug and the liquids it'd left on the floor, and left the room, but Eren's concentration was already broken. He cleaned up the paperwork and put it away, moving back up to his bedroom.

Not entirely sure what he was doing, he pulled out his old sketchbook from in his cupboard and began to sketch. It'd been so long since he'd done this, his pencil putting down wide, clean strokes as he worked. He did not use any self taught technique and he knew it was showing in the work, but it didn't matter. It was just a piece to occupy himself for a little while, no more and no less.

He'd just been aiming to draw a face, and it hadn't really occurred to him as he didn't color in the hair, as he made the eyes wide and inviting, and finished off the curve of the chin that he was subconsciously drawing Armin.

It startled him, in a way. Mikasa was right—Eren was becoming way too emotionally invested in Armin, somebody who didn't need to put up with someone like Eren Jaeger at all. It was frightening, Eren thought, how much Armin had taken over his mind in these short days, and it was definitely unhealthy. He mused to himself that if he was Armin, he'd probably be terrified.

There were mistakes and flaws in the drawing though, which calmed Eren a little bit. The hair was too long in places, and parted in the wrong spot. The nose was too wide, and the cheeks were a bit too thin. He didn't know whether it comforted him that there were mistakes in the composition, or whether it worried him more that he'd been able to spot them now so quickly.

Eren knew that he'd always had a bit of an obsessive personality. When he was a child, everything was done to the utmost standard that he held it to, not a hair out of place. He didn't like engineering, so he was always terrible at it. He liked art, so he would produce frankly outrageous amounts of work over months, spending every moment of his day painting even though there was always somebody around who was trying to drag him to bigger and better things.

Would Eren be good for Armin though? He didn't know. Armin was so resistant to so much that Eren had tried on him—offering presents, expensive dates. Armin didn't want anything from Eren, and that frustrated him. People always wanted things, it was the core of the human psyche, he figured. Desire for more, desire for better things. But Armin turned Eren down on these things, and it frustrated Eren. People wanted things, so Eren bought them things—it was like an instant formula to friends, so why wasn't it working anymore?

Mikasa said that because Eren was doing paperwork, maybe Armin was good for Eren, but Eren wasn't sure. Armin was definitely making Eren realize some things that Eren wasn't very comfortable with about himself, and it made Eren feel that drunken and confused was better than sober and aware.

* * *

Planning dates was hard on a budget. Eren was bad at planning dates in general—seeing as he'd never really had one before, but this was a next level plane of difficulty. All the things that he thought could be romantic or fun for them to do, he realized would cripple Armin or just be impossible if the stubborn boy tried to pay for half like he had insisted. Dinner, Eren could do, but what would Armin like? It frustrated him.

"What are you fretting about now?" Mikasa asked, finding Eren in the kitchen brewing coffee and nine in the evening.

"What kind of date am I supposed to take him on if he insists on paying half?" Eren asked, pulling a mug out of the cupboard, as the pungent scent of coffee began to fill the room.

"A date that doesn't cost anything," Mikasa said plainly. "Cook him dinner," she said, and laughed at the incredulous expression Eren made. "Hire somebody to prepare a picnic," she said, "and say it was you, and have a picnic in the park under the stars. Ask him about his hopes and dreams. Don't be creepy," she went on.

"Mikasa, since when are you an event planner?" Eren asked.

"I'm not," Mikasa said, "I'm just not hard-headed like you. For the creative one, you're awfully narrow-minded about romance. It's not all gifts and flattery, Eren." She softened a little bit, and smiled at Eren. "You really like him, don't you?" she said. "I'm gonna have to scare the shit out of him, then."

* * *

The "Date" of sorts was the next day, and Armin was afraid. He didn't bother to stop for a coffee on his way from the factory to the bar and thus arrived early, and after changing from his work clothes to the waiter's uniform, he went to help Marco at the bar like he usually did, leaving the annoying jobs like vacuuming, cleaning the windows, and setting the tables to the likes of Connie and Sasha.

"Are you alright?" Marco asked, noticing the lack of Armin's usual talkativeness right away. Armin was meek, and he admitted it, but he'd never been tight lipped and he enjoyed conversation.

"Um, kind of worried, I guess?" Armin said dumping a rag in soapy water to wipe down the bar with. Marco knew about the whole Eren situation now, as Armin had chosen to fill him in, even knowing that the details would eventually trickle down to Sasha and Connie—he just hoped he wouldn't be breaking into anymore luxury complexes with those two. "I think I'm getting in too deep. Maybe Eren's a stalker. Who knows? I don't, I definitely don't. Oh my god, what if he kills me?"

"Calm down," Marco said in a soothing voice, as he rearranged some wine glasses. "You have nothing to worry about," he went on, "Jean said that Eren's really high strung, but there's nothing inherently wrong with him... per se."

"Inherently wrong?" Armin said, something dropping in his stomach at the words "per se".

"Well, uh, this is second hand information and apparently Jean and Eren have issues going back a long time, but when Carla Jaeger died and Grisha disappeared, Eren got really, really depressed. Like, he would stay in his bed for days at a time, and when his sister would drag him out he wouldn't speak or really do much of anything," Marco said. Armin frowned a little bit. Depression? He wasn't sure if he could deal with something like that, he had his own issues. Before Armin could even respond, Marco opened his mouth again, and said, "There was something about anger issues too, apparently, he used to get in a lot of fights when he and Jean went to engineering school. But apparently he went to therapy before the mess with his parents and that mostly got straightened out, I guess."

Armin shuddered, "What am I getting into?" he said aloud. At the same time, the door jingled, and Connie walked in whistling some tune with his fast food joint uniform on still, and he made a rude hand gesture at them on his way to the back room. Marco and Armin stared for a moment, but Armin moved on, and said, "I dunno, I'm getting an entirely different weird vibe out of the whole thing."

"What do you mean?" Marco asked calmly, as he adjusted his apron.

"I dunno, Eren is just _so_, _impossibly_, rich. I feel like he pities me, and maybe he thinks I'm hot or sexy or something, but I also can't help feeling like I'm some kind of charity project. I know I've got a sob story behind me, but I don't want that to shape who I am now, right? It's the past." Armin said, suddenly blushing a little as he said it. Marco knew about Armin's whole messy history, about the parents, and the alcohol, and the straight A's but no future, but Armin still hated to talk about that. The person Armin was five years ago was a stranger to him now.

"If Eren thinks about you like that because of where you're from and whose son you are, he's an idiot," Marco said, and Armin straightened a bit at those words because they were basically the most insulting thing about another person he'd ever heard come out of Marco's mouth. "However," Marc said, "I've heard enough from Jean and the papers, and Eren is not an idiot."

Armin shrugged, and tried to find something else for himself to do at the bar. There was nothing. He was only to be standing here as long as Marco held up the conversation, he figured. "I guess," he finally said.

"Don't worry about it," Marco said, "try to enjoy yourself, okay?"

"I will," Armin sighed.

"By the way, I've got a date too," Marco said, with a little bit of a blush coloring his cheeks. "With Jean." He smiled again. "Go set tables," he told Armin with a smile.

* * *

**A/N: Originally submitted to AO3 on 1-5-2014.**

**Original story notes: **

**Hi I'm Laura and welcome to my fanfic.**

**Hey everybody, sorry for the lack of warning of the shift in my update schedule. My vacation is officially over, and I'm sitting in a hotel in Orlando waiting to fly out at seven in the morning tomorrow... [cries]**

**Since I'm back at school on Monday, I hope to settle into a schedule of updating once a week. Maybe more frequent, maybe less, but we'll figure that out as we go along. (And hopefully figure out what exactly the plot is oops)**

**Anyways, thank you for your lovely comments, kudos, and bookmarks! I don't always reply but a great excitement grips my heart everytime I see "Inbox (1)" when I log into AO3. Bless.**


	7. Under the Stars

Armin stared at the mirror, and felt frustrated. There was a long crack near the bottom right corner, and a picture tucked in the side of Armin and his grandfather on the day he'd finished eleventh grade.

Also, in the mirror, was himself. Shaggy hair and eyebrows he'd always personally thought of as a little too strong for his features, and a nearly faded scar on his forehead, which was usually covered by his bangs, from falling down the stairs. His nose was a little red, so he rubbed it to investigate, and figured by the tenderness that it was chapped, and he was going to be getting a cold soon. Ugh. That would mean he couldn't work until he recovered, due to the new public health regulations.

He looked at his small array of casual clothes, and tried to find a way to make them look clean and slick. But, there wasn't many of them, and they were all a bit old and worn. He picked up the green button down shirt he'd worn in his senior picture, and looked it over. The collar was a little frayed, but otherwise the shirt remained in good condition. He put it on carefully, especially as he did the buttons, because a few were a little stressed and could pop off. As he moved his arms a bit in it, he realized the shirt was a looser fit than it had been before, and frowned a little. Still, it looked nice, and the color was still deep and rich, not at all faded. He remembered how his grandfather used to say that it accented his eyes.

He made his other choices more quickly, putting on jeans and his regularly sneakers, and a hat with ear flaps over his head because it was a bit cold outside and he had no idea what they were going to do.

They'd agreed to meet in Midtown Trost district, and the bus fare Armin paid wasn't exactly highway robbery as it always was to just get around Shiganshina, since it was a different bus service, but it still made his wallet mourn. He'd usually avoided going places he couldn't walk too, his entire life.

He sat on the hard bus seat and tried to make himself look small next to this stranger, which wasn't exactly hard. Every nerve in his body was on fire, and Armin honestly felt scared. He wouldn't want Eren to see that, but he had no reason to hold it in while surrounded by all these strangers. The city streets flicked by him, and every neighborhood seemed to get a little nicer, until Armin finally got off the bus in front of the complex in Trost District. It was one of the areas many commerce center's, and the sheer number of people packed into this tiny space was a bit terrifying. How was he supposed to find Eren in the middle of a crowd like this one?

Eren was supposed to meet him by the fountain. Armin pushed through the group of people towards the huge stone fountain, and looked, trying to find someone familiar. The air was getting a bit chilly, and suddenly he wished he'd brought his jacket, but the thing was so puffy and old that he felt a bit embarrassed about it. Armin shivered, and surveyed the people here. None of them looked like Eren.

A hand gripped Armin's shoulder, and he jumped a little bit, turning to find Eren staring at him. "Hey," Eren said, a small frown flickering over his face. "Why aren't you wearing a jacket?" he asked, "You look cold." Armin shrugged, and Eren looked somehow worried. He shrugged off his own jacket, and handed it to Armin, who put it on gratefully, noticing Eren was clad in a thick sweater underneath.

Eren's jacket was so warm. It was still residually hot from Eren's body heat, and the inside seemed to be lined with some kind of fur that was just so soft. The jacket was also to big for him, and just the bottom half of his fingers stuck out of the ends of the sleeves. "Come on," said Eren, "We'll find a jacket that's just for you. And you're not paying half, it's a gift."

Armin opened his mouth to protest as Eren dragged him towards one of the stores. The stores here were way too expensive for Armin—he'd feel so embarrassed if he let Eren buy him something here—but he also realized that Eren would insisted on Armin wearing his jacket all night if he'd didn't have one, and Armin didn't want him to shiver.

The store Eren dragged him into was brightly lit, but the clothing in it was in muted colors, and it was very quiet. The store wasn't heated very warmly, probably because of the doors to the outside constantly opening and closing.

He found himself being dragged towards the coat rack, which was pretty large. "Find one you like," Eren said, and Armin immediately gravitated towards the smalls, but he heard Eren cough a bit, and then he blushed when Armin turned to look at him. "Um," Eren said, "I like the way my jacket looks on you... a bit too big."

Something dropped in Armin's stomach but not in a bad way. He smiled. "All right," he said, and moved towards the larges instead, rifling through the selection, feeling the material. He found a gray colored pea coat that he liked, and pulled it off the rack, pulling it over his shoulders and buttoning it up slowly. The coat reached his mid thighs and the inside was lined with something warmed, and he looked at Eren and said, "Isn't this one nice?"

"Yeah," Eren replied, as Armin pulled the coat off and tried to turn the price tag over, but Eren whisked it out of his hands and said, "No," putting an arm hesitantly around his shoulder to lead him away.

The queue was short, and Eren paid for the jacket with a credit card and ripped off the price tag right after, to give to the clerk to throw away. Armin put on the coat in the corner before the two walked out the door. He felt a little embarrassed, but still, it was a brand new coat, and it being too large seemed to make Eren happy.

Eren cleared his throat, and said, "We're gonna get in my car, and I'm gonna drive you somewhere, okay?"

"Alright," Armin said calmly, and they walked up the steps to the parking garage, and Eren unlocked a small black car swiftly, opening the door for Armin, who blushed at the affection. The car was plush, but it was not like the first of Eren's cars that Armin had rode in days before, and he couldn't find a logo anywhere. He felt slightly more comfortable in this car though, as Eren revved the engine.

"Did you not have a coat at all?" Eren asked a little worriedly as they pulled down the garage towards the pay booth.

"Um, I had a coat," Armin said, "but I don't really wear it because it's really old and worn, and kind of gross looking, to be honest." He picked a little at the pea coat. "This coat is much nicer. Thank you very much."

"You shouldn't reject what people give you," Eren said.

"I see a difference between charity and gifts," Armin said, his tone softer. "I guess you buying me this made you happy though. But I don't really want to talk about it."

Eren tuned the radio, picking up a popular pop station pretty easily. They both listened to the music, feeling agitated by it, until Armin finally reached over and turned it off. "Sorry," he said.

"No," Eren said, "I don't really like that music either. I just thought you might, was all."

They drove out of Trost, towards richer districts, and actually maintained a pleasant chatter the whole way. Instead of talking about much of anything important, they told simple stories about school and work, family and responsibility, and a warm feeling spread through the conversation as Armin watched buildings flick by and the sky slowly open up.

Finally, Eren pulled to a stop outside a large, gated area, and told Armin to wait by the front of the car, before reaching in back towards the trunk, and pulling out an actual picnic basket, and an armful of blankets. "Will you hold these?" he asked, and Armin picked up the blankets as they walked in, and he realized they were in a park.

Eren seemed to know the whole place like the back of his hand, and weaved them down a few paths to a little flat area by an artificial lake. He set down the basket and helped Armin spread out the largest blanket on the grass, before the two settled down and began to take out the food in the basket.

Armin worried that it would be something ridiculous and fancy, but a few sandwiches came out of the small basket, a jug of flavored water, and some potato salad. They divvied up the food quickly between them and started to eat, Armin making an approving noise as he bit into his sandwich.

"This is really good," he said liltingly between bites.

"Yeah," said Eren, "Mikasa and our cook made the food together. You wouldn't really expect it from someone like Mikasa, but she really enjoys cooking. I think it makes her feel a little bit less stressed out."

"Huh," said Armin. "I never really learned to cook," he went on, "we didn't eat hot meals much. I've usually lived on bread and protein bars," he said with a shrug, continuing to eat.

He didn't notice the intense gaze that Eren kept upon him after Eren had finished his food.

"The stars are really pretty out here," Armin said after a few moments, looking up at the dark sky filled with all the twinkling, far off lights. "Have you ever painted the stars?" he asked Eren.

Instead of his usual knee jerk reaction of frustration at the mention of his paintings, Eren smiled. "I haven't," he said calmly, "but if you wanted me too, I could."

Armin finished his food, and they cleaned up the containers and the plates, sweeping them up in the basket. It was truly pretty here, and after eating, Armin didn't want to move, even though he knew he should probably go home so he could go to work in the morning.

Instead, he let Eren throw blankets over his legs, as they somehow drifted from sitting up and looking at the sky to lying down and looking at each other.

What was he doing, Armin wondered, as he pulled his body closer to Eren's their bodies flush against each other. He barely knew Eren, but there was something that just seemed like home in him. The air was cold, but Eren was warm.

Eren brushed his lips softly over Armin's forehead, kneading his fingers in his hair. "Don't worry about work tomorrow," he whispered, "I'll give you something to do, okay?"

Armin drifted off slowly, and Eren worried about the crick he would surely have in his neck come morning.

* * *

**A/N: Originally submitted to AO3 on 1-10-2014.**

**Original story notes:**

**HI I'M BACK WITH MY AU NOBODY WANTED OR ASKED FOR**

**I'm sorry, but the idea of Armin dress in oversized clothes is utterly adorable to me. Armin utterly adorable.**

**Contact me on tumblr to write mean messages in my ask telling me to write faster during the school week. (Link likely broken: aphvainamoinen on tumblr)**

**I just want to thank everyone, also, for all the lovely feedback. Nearly a 100 kudos already? How?**


	8. Over the Phone

The phone rang incessantly from across the room, and Mikasa groaned. Who used the land line anymore? She stretched on her bed and threw her feet on the floor, crossing her room quickly and picking up the phone, trying to sound a bit polite. "Hello?" she said.

"Hello, this is _Chase Visa_," a voice said over the phone, "May I assume I am speaking with Eren Jaeger or Mikasa Ackerman?"

Mikasa's brow furrowed, but she adjusted her feet and thought, why the credit card company? She didn't waste time in replying, though, and said, "This is Miss Ackerman speaking."

"Alright," the woman over the phone said, "We are just calling to inform you that there was an incident in Mexico City of a fraudulent person attempting to use Grisha Jaeger's canceled credit card. Due to the high priority nature of your transactions with us, we've chosen to both email the Jaeger household and inform you over the phone of the incident."

"Thank you," Mikasa said, "is there anything else?"

"No, Miss Ackerman. Thank you for your time."

"Goodbye," Mikasa said, but she was pretty sure the person on the other side of the line had already hung up.

* * *

Eren woke up with Armin's hair scratching on his chin, and his arm half dead. He groaned a little, and shivered in the cold air, as he pulled his arm out from under the blond. His back hurt a bit from sleeping on the ground, and as Eren shifted, Armin fidgeted and yawned.

Eren guessed it was mid-to-late morning, and Armin was late for work, but Eren didn't care. If there was one thing Eren was uncomfortable with involving his relationship with Armin, it was, that for all intents and purposes, Eren was technically Armin's employer, and it put him in a sort of position of power over the man that frankly made him feel a bit uncomfortable.

"'S cold," Armin mumbled, curling up more. Eren moved a little to pull Armin closer to him, leaning over him and kissing him gently on the cheek.

Armin blinked again sleepily, his heart throbbing wildly though as he shifted more as Eren moved to hover above him, staring at intently on him with a gaze that made Armin feel like Eren was cutting through skin and hurtling past barriers. Armin felt like Eren was trying to break through all of his defenses and truly see him, and it was _hot._

Eren leaned in closer, and their lips met. Armin felt like his heart stopped and then stuttered, as he lifted his hands to wrap around Eren's neck, begging him to come closer, to dismantle every fortified blockade and make Armin feel something new.

Eren pulled away far too soon, taking a big breath of air and smiling at Armin. "You're perfect," he whispered, but then he got up, and said, "We should get back to my house. Mikasa's going to be scandalized."

Armin couldn't help but smile.

* * *

On the way back, Armin had protested about his lack of work, so when they arrived at the house Eren had sent him to Mikasa, who undoubtedly found something for him to do that they could pay him for. Bundling up in his office, Eren called Jean.

"Hello?" Jean answered, sounding perfectly calm.

"I need to call in a favor," Eren said, irritated that it had even come to this point.

"I don't think that you've done me a favor," Jean said, "like, ever. But what is it?"

"Help Armin find a paid internship with your family's company," Eren said. "He wants to be an engineer anyways, and I just can't have him working for our company anymore. It's weird. It makes me feel like I'm fucked up."

"And what do I get in return?" Jean asked plainly.

"I'll tell Armin to get you Marco gossip."

"Done."

* * *

"You really don't have to do this," Mikasa said, watching Armin scrub the counters vigorously.

"No," Armin said, "I need the money."

"Eren was the one who kept you," Mikasa countered, "So, he'll give you the money you're missing."

"No," Armin refused, spraying more granite cleaner on the counter. "I don't want any of your charity," he said. "I take care of myself."

Mikasa suddenly felt very exasperated with Armin's stubbornness. Then again, she supposed, it made Armin a good match for Eren. They were both pigheaded. He scrubbed a bit more, and Mikasa figured she'd never seen her counters more clean.

Eren wandered into the room then, slipping a bill into Armin's back pocket. "Hey!" Mikasa barked, "Inappropriate for the kitchen!"

Eren grinned at Mikasa as Armin pulled the bill back out from his pocket again. "Eren..." he said, "I can't take this from you."

"Yeah you can, it's a birthday present. Happy birthday." Eren said jovially, "I'll go get the champagne."

"My birthday isn't until next week," Armin said.

"You're birthday's next week?" Mikasa said.

At the same time, Eren was saying, "Why didn't you tell me! How am I supposed to get you a good present now?"

"You're not," Armin said, pressing his lips together thinly. "You just gave me a good present."

"Oh come on!" Eren protested.

Armin walked over to the sink and filled up a glass with water, gazing quietly at Eren as if the room hadn't just fallen silent. Eren blushed then, and scooted himself over to Armin, as Mikasa turned away, rolling her eyes as Eren grappled for Armin's attention. Honestly, if Armin couldn't see how crazy Eren was about him, he'd need his eyes checked.

Eren jostled Armin playfully, and the blonde lost his fragile grip on the glass and it fell. "Ahk!" he explained. "I'm so, so, sorry, I'll pay you back for it, I swear!" he said, starting to babble.

"It's fine," Mikasa said quietly.

"Me and Mikasa drop and break things literally all of the time," Eren said with a grin.

Armin smiled a thin smile then, and looked at Mikasa, as if desperate to get out of the situation. "You said you'd have somebody drive me back to my apartment?" Why did Armin have to leave? Eren wanted him to stay.

Right, Armin had another job.

"Yes," Mikasa said. "Just go down that hallway," she pointed to her right, "and at the very end is a door. Go through it and you'll be in the garage, and we've got a driver waiting to take you home."

"Thank you," Armin said, smiling again, and then looking at Eren. "C'mere," he said, and Eren walked closer and enveloped the smaller man in a hug. Armin kissed him lightly on the nose, and smiled. "I'll see you soon, okay?" he said, and finally pulled away, and walked down the hall.

"Bye," Eren called weakly, getting the same call back in turn.

"He's really something, isn't he?" Mikasa said quietly, as they heard the door to the garage open. "No offense though," she continued, "he kind of smells."

"Yeah," Eren said dreamily, entirely unaware of what Mikasa had said.

* * *

"Hey Armin," Sasha prodded, "where'd you get that fancy new coat hanging up in the back room?"

"Your mom," Armin sighed, not even looking up from the trays he was in the middle of washing.

"Oh come on!" she went on, "you can trust me and Connie!"

"Get to your side work," Armin said. "Besides, last time I trusted you, didn't it end up with us breaking into a private gated community?"

"And I'm betting an indirect consequence of that was you getting an expensive jacket, so tell me about it!" Sasha persisted.

"Oh, just tell us about it," Marco laughed from behind the bar, in the middle of washing his hands.

"Tell us about what?" Connie said, as he wandered over sleepily.

"Er, Eren and I went on a date and I didn't wear my jacket because it was really gross, and then he got protective and insisting on buying one or making me wear his all night," Armin said, "And I didn't really want him to freeze. He picked out the jacket himself kind of," he fibbed, "I guess it was nice."

Sasha hummed, "How come you get all the luck? You've got someone tripping all over themselves to spend money on you and you turn it down. What kind of life is that?"

"I don't want him to date me because he feels bad for me," Armin said, "and letting him sort of... flaunt that difference in power makes me super uncomfortable."

* * *

As Mikasa and Eren ate dinner, Mikasa finally brought up the call from that morning. "So," Mikasa said, "funny thing, huh? Somebody tried to use Grisha's credit card in Mexico."

Eren dropped his fork. "What?

"And, uh, not just the credit card information. The actual physical card."

* * *

**A/N: **

**Fuck transition chapters they suck they're short and I hate them**

**Honestly, most of this chapter is me snidely making fun of my own cliches.**


	9. Bills, Bills, Bills

The next time Armin came around, it was with a check shoved into his back pocket. Eren and Mikasa had insisted upon celebrating his birthday, so Armin had arrived (by bus fare, thank you very much) and walked up the streets until he arrived at Eren and Mikasa's mansion, and pressed the bell.

"This is actually the first time you've shown up here, besides that time in the middle of the night, without Eren, huh?" Mikasa said, opening the door and waving him inside. "Hi, by the way," she added.

"Hello," Armin said, before saying, "and yeah, I guess its the first time I've shown up without assistance..." He kicked off his shoes in the foyer.

Armin was started to figure out his way around the bottom floor of the house. The foyer had two doors, one leading to the dining room and the other the living room. Eren and Mikasa both had offices through the living room, and from the dining room he could get to the kitchen, the bathroom, and the hall leading to the garage. Mikasa led Armin into the living room, where Eren sat on one of the plush couches playing a game on his tablet.

"Eren, your guest," Mikasa said, and Eren looked up, a hugely bright smile gracing his features.

It was strange how much a smile could change a person, Armin would muse, because when Eren smiled he seemed like a different person. "Armin!" Eren jumped up, pulling him into a hug. "We haven.'t seen each other in forever!" he whined.

"It's been five days," Armin said, with a smile, pulling Eren's arms off of him. "Oh, by the way, I wanted to give you this," he said, pulling out the check. "For the glass."

"Armin, you don't have to," Mikasa said, watching the exchange nervously. Eren just pocketed the money.

"No, I insist," Armin said, and Mikasa pursued the subject no further, after receiving a deploring look from Eren.

Mikasa decided to give Eren and Armin a few minutes of privacy, and she walked into the kitchen where the two presents were stowed on the counter. She and Eren had agreed to get them to Armin first thing, and to have cake later in the afternoon. The cake stood on the counter too, with a glass cover.

She picked up the larger, heavier package that she'd chosen to give him. She had a very difficult time choosing a gift, because she hardly knew Armin, but she liked him a lot. Eren hadn't told him what the smaller box he'd wrapped contained, and said she had to wait to see it, just like Armin.

Mikasa took her time walking back to the living room, where she found Eren and Armin sitting intertwined on the couch. It was cute, she would admit, but she didn't react, and neither did Eren, and Armin followed his lead, even though he turned bright red when Eren pressed a kiss to his cheek as Mikasa set the presents down on Armin's lap and took a seat next to them on the couch. "Open them," she said warmly, smiling at the two.

Armin blushed again, and set the smaller gift on a sliver of couch in front of him, orienting Mikasa gift in his lap as he read the label on it. "You really shouldn't have," he said quietly, but he still smiled at her.

She grinned back. "Too late," she said, "We already did. Don't let it go to waste."

The small man slowly started ripping along the lines of tape until he could pull the loud paper off neatly, unwrapping it without much of a hitch or noise. It was a book, and a thick, heavy one at that. He turned it over in his head, and read, _"Photo Journal – Adventures in Costa Rice"_. "Thank you," Armin said, his smiling turning into a grin as he scrutinized the photo on the cover, the ocean leading up to the coastline.

"Eren said you liked tropical places," Mikasa explained. "So I saw that... and thought of you."

"I love it," Armin said, before looking at Eren with a face Mikasa was sure was going to give her cavities. "Yours now?" he said sweetly, picking up the smaller package again. It was about a third the width of the book, and a little bit shoulder. It was not heavy, but it had a pleasant weight to the touch as he held it in his hands and turned it until he found the line of tape, jotting his finger under it and carefully ripping the wrapping off.

The box read "Visconti". He carefully pulled the top off, and pulled out an absolutely stunning pen. The body shone in the dim light of the room, and it felt pleasant in his hands.

"I know it's not really... personal," Eren said, "but I thought there's a certain pride in a good fountain pen... I wanted you to have one," he continued, "there's just something very enrapturing about it." He squeezed Armin's shoulders a little tighter.

A couple tears pricked at the corners of Armin's eyes. He wiped them away quickly, and said, "I don't know what I did to deserve someone who cares as much as you," he said to Eren. "And I don't know how I got such a sweet friend," he told Mikasa.

Mikasa made herself scarce soon after, and Eren pulled Armin to his lap after transporting them to a reclining chair with Armin's new Costa Rica book. They turned on the lamp next to the chair, and pulled up the foot rest, Armin leaning against Eren as he opened up the book and flipped through it, looking more at the picture's than reading the traveler's notes that accompanied them.

Armin lingered especially on the shots of beaches, and the ones that had animals or flowers in them. He pointed out details in the pictures that Eren would have never seen himself, a shift in the pristine sand, a beetle sitting on the leaf of a flower petal in the corner of a shot.

Armin was so enthusiastic with the pictures, it made Eren feel like Mikasa had done a better job with giving than he, planting a seed or two of insecurity in his stomach, but the feelings washed over quickly, because Eren was just happy to watch Armin be happy. Maybe that was all he truly needed after all.

After awhile passed like this, Mikasa called them into the kitchen, and Armin set the book down on the end table and the two disentangled, walking hand and hand into the other room. As soon as Eren let go of his hand, Armin found he missed it—it was such a sweet, innocent touch, he wanted more of it.

Armin gasped at the cake that stood on the stand in the middle of the breakfast table in the kitchen. It had two layers, with white frosting that wasn't really all that impressive, but it was still pretty and the frosting roses covering the top of the cake were just so lovely. "How old are you turning, anyways?" Mikasa asked as he ogled it.

"24," Armin said. "Huh, I feel old. You're both 21, right?" he said.

"Yeah," Eren echoed quietly, as Mikasa plopped a '2' and a '4' candle on top of the second layer of the cake. She pulled out a lighter and set them alight without much emotion in the movement.

"This is the first time I've had a cake in so long... Not since I can remember. There were pictures of my first birthday with my parents, but that was it," he breathed out, the emotion welling up in his voice. "I don't deserve any of this."

"You deserve all of it," Mikasa said, before starting to sing in a wavering voice. "_Happy Birthday to you,_"

Eren joined in. _"Happy birthday to you, happy birthday to you! Happy birthday dear Armin, happy birthday to you!_" They finished, Eren shouting, "Make a wish!" Armin thought about it for a moment, before blowing out the two candles and grinning. "What'd you wish for?" Eren implored.

"My lips are sealed," Armin said, as Mikasa began to cut him a slice of cake.

* * *

The morning after his birthday, Armin woke up to the phone in his apartment ringing. He had this morning off from work at the factory, so he'd been planning to sleep in.

He sighed as he swung his legs over the side of the bed and picked up his phone saying, "Hello?", trying not to sound as tired as he felt.

"Hi, is this Armin? It's Jean," said the voice over the phone. Armin was vaguely surprised. Why would Jean being calling him anyways?

"This is Armin," he said, "How are you?" he asked pleasantly.

"I'm fine," Jean said, "and you?"

"I just woke up, but otherwise I'm well," Armin said.

"Oh, sorry for waking you up," Jean said, genuine apology leaking in through his voice. "I'd like to ask you about a pretty serious offer though."

"Um, okay?" Armin asked.

"I'd like to ask you if you'd like to work in the office as an intern," Jean said, "You'll be paid $5.35 an hour, and it's at the same hours as your current day job."

"Okay," Armin said. "I'm listening. But why are you offering this?"

"Well, to be honest," Jean said, "Eren asked me to. It really wigs him out that he's technically your boss, but he knows you have an interest in engineering, so he contacted me. With a background at the office, you might be able to get into a good engineering school even without a specialized scientific high school," Jean said.

Armin wasn't sure how to feel about that. Again, Eren was acting as if he was trying to wrestle Armin's life and autonomy out of his hands, but at the same time, it was such a great offer, and he was never going to get a chance like this again.

"I'll do it."

"Awesome," Jean said. "I'm emailing you the details now, so I'll see you here at the office soon, alright? And the clothes you wear as a waiter will work fine the first couple of days. Ask Eren for hand-me-downs if you want to fit in more, though."

"Thank you, so much," Armin finally said, the gratitude bleeding out over his words.

"You're welcome," Jean said, "we're happy to have you. I'm sure you're a great worker," and with that, the heir to the engineering giant hung up, and Armin wanted to cry.

* * *

"I'm calling to tell you I'm resigning," Armin's voice came over the phone, a small laugh bubbling up somewhere beneath it.

"Huh? Resigning? What do you mean?" Eren asked, leaning back in his swizzle chair, trying to get the words to connect somewhere in his brain and start to make a little bit of sense.

"Jean offered me an internship!" Armin said over the phone. "He made it clear you pushed him into it though," he babbled, "but it's okay, I guess, and I accepted the offer! So I'm not sewing anymore shirts for you anymore."

"I'll feel free to notify your supervisor," Eren said with a grin. "Make me proud, okay?"

"I don't need to make you proud, you'd show me off no matter what," Armin said sweetly, "but I guess I'll try to make myself proud."

"I love you," Eren tried to say, but at the same time, he heard the phone click, and he was left to wonder if Armin had heard those words fall out of his mouth and between his teeth or not.

Eren set his phone down, and pulled out the check that he and Mikasa hadn't cashed in again. It was for fifteen dollars, which was actually a lot more than the glass had been worth, but the real worth of this check was the signature that lay on one of the lines. Exactly what Eren had been looking for, two painstakingly neat and clean words, written in perfect loopy cursive, "Armin Arlert".

He pulled out his paper again, and worked on it a little bit more, trying to copy the signature again. He had always been an artist and good at writing, and he was good at forgery, writing his father's name on many a paper in middle and high school.

Within a few more minutes, Eren found that he could sign in Armin's name. He pulled out the legal forms again, looking over all the finances and columns and numbers, finding the spots for initials and for signatures.

It wasn't that hard really, to move Armin's autopay for his bills and rent to come from his bank account to Eren's instead.

* * *

On Monday morning, Armin woke up early, showered, got dressed and ate breakfast with extra time to go. There was a certain agitation grinding in his bones, and dare he say it, he was excited to go to work. Even though he'd gotten to this point because of Eren, he actually had a means of reaching his life long goal now, and it felt amazing.

Maybe self esteem was something he should try on more often. He thought of Eren as he pushed the fountain pen into the inner pocket of one of his thinner jackets, which was presentable enough for office work, and then pushed his wallet into his pants pocket, before stepping into the worn and loved formal shoes he'd inherited from his grandfather, even though the shoes were brown and his pants were black.

Armin knew that he'd probably be spending more time today getting coffee and running papers all over a building than learning anything about engineering, but it still felt good.

To be working towards something bigger.

A/N: Ahh, plotty things are happening! Also notice that I figured out how long this thing is going to be. (19 chapters) I love you all~~ 


	10. Starts

**A/N: The amazing awsmmasa on tumblr drew art for You Are Not! I found it on my dash per chance. I saw the first two panels and thought, "this is familiar" and then I read the rest of it and thought, "of course it's familiar you big idiot, you wrote it." and then I was so happy I started crying. So go check it out, like/reblog it, shower the artist with love. That's what I did.**

* * *

WHO IS JAEGER'S MYSTERY GIRL... OR GUY?  
Grisha Jaeger's son Eren, notorious for his belligerence to the family company Jaeger Groups, may have a special someone. Sources say that this mysterious beau is a young man. The two have been spotted together on multiple occasions by multiple witnesses, holding hands, with arms around each other, and cuddling.

* * *

Armin settled into work at Jean's office quickly. He ran errands and delivered messages. He brewed coffee and put stamps on letters. He quickly fit into the routine. Many of the older men and women who worked there ignored him, but Jean's true purpose for Armin's employment became clear—he wanted to ask Armin questions about Marco.

"So, what kind of food do you think he would like best? You know, for like, a casual but still nice date?" Jean was asking on Armin's third day at work.

"Italian," Armin replied as he tidied up some files.

Jean was quiet for a few minutes, idly tapping numbers on his number pad into a spreadsheet on his computer screen. Then, he opened his mouth and said, "Do you think he'd prefer middle or high budget? Because I'd just kind of instinctually prefer high budget, but I don't want to constantly be showing off my wealth like Jaeger seems to be doing to you."

Armin didn't say anything about the second half of the comment, but he calmly said, "Marco would rather middle budget. Meals over thirty dollars and he gets flustered," Armin said, deciding to omit that meals over thirty dollars flustered him too. He didn't know what he'd do if Eren tried to take him out to dinner.

Most of Armin's days seemed somewhat like this, filled with busy work that would sometimes be punctuated with Jean asking him about imaginary dates that he didn't actually take Marco on (even though they spent obnoxious amounts of time together off the clock, and Jean was constantly at the bar) that Armin could tell were imaginary because Marco didn't want to tell him all about them.

Armin didn't mind the job at all though, he really enjoyed it. The commute was a bit harder in the morning, but he no longer had to change between leaving the factory and arriving at the bar, and the environment was far more pleasant. Even though he was still doing grunt work and his salary was still a bit insulting, it was a push ahead, and he felt a lot more respected at this job than he had before.

It wasn't really, but it still felt like a step up, towards a step out of the nasty life he'd been living. What it gave him, beyond the money anyways, was hope.

Jean smiled a little as he watched Armin, who was absorbed in the small task, and nudged the gossip rag with a blurry photograph of him on the cover a bit more under the papers on his desk. Really, the longer Armin didn't know about this, the better.

* * *

Eren had bought new paints.

The colors he bought were bright, garish even, some would say, and Eren did not often work with such bright colors.

It had taken him some time to actually put brush to the canvas again, to give up his fears up ruining something before it had even become anything, but once he'd started painting again he just couldn't stop. The drive and the desire to create just burst out of him, and even when he only made a stroke or two over a long period of time, he still felt like he'd done something.

The picture was far from complete, and he still wasn't entirely sure what he was painting, or maybe what he _wasn't _painting was a greater uncertainty.

It was all Armin in the end. Eren didn't think he'd tell the blond for a while, but he knew this sudden burst of artistic drive and inspiration had come from his feelings for him. He'd wanted to do something for Armin, something that indicated effort instead of just the consumption of money, and even if the painting was still kept at his house (Eren figured it'd be a trip to get it into Armin's little apartment—and he didn't want him staying there much longer anyways) it would be Armin's, and Eren still would have to put substantial work in it.

And since the abstract painting was for Armin, it had to be perfect. But Eren had a lot of practice, he just had to get back into the feel of it.

* * *

"There he is," Levi said to Erwin, pointing through the glass door of the office to where Eren was rushing down the hallway, his scarf coming undone.

"He never comes when he's supposed to, does he?" Erwin said, getting out of his chair as Levi picked up the magazine and they rushed out the office door.

"Eren, Eren!" Erwin yelled, causing the boy to pause and turn around to face them, apparently distracted from whatever his mission was. Eren walked over closer, looking confused.

"What is it?" He asked.

"Explain this," Levi said, throwing it at Eren. It was a magazine with the headline, 'Who is Jaeger's mystery girl... or guy?'. Eren stared at it for a moment, his brow furrowed. Yeah, that was definitely Armin. It was blurry, but Eren would know that endearing bowl cut anywhere.

"What, I'm not allowed to date?" he finally said.

"You're allowed to date, but you're _not _allowed to cause scandals," Levi bit back, pointing at the little blurb. "Right here, it says, 'notorious for his belligerence', not to mention you're going to have the family friendly groups trying to eat you alive if it's another man." Eren was quiet. "It's another man, isn't it?" Levi sighed.

"Like you can say anything!" Eren burst out, pointing at Erwin.

To Erwin's infinite credit, he didn't squirm and look awkward like Eren would've in that sort of situation. "Eren, we're just trying to act in the company's best interests," Erwin said, "and when stuff like this gets out, it reflects badly on everyone."

"Stop!" Eren said. "Bring it up at the actual meeting or something, I don't care. Just leave me alone right now, I'm only here to pick up Mikasa." And with that, Eren threw the magazine on the floor and kept walking towards Mikasa's office.

"Don't think you can escape us!" Levi yelled sarcastically. "We'll find you!"

* * *

"Hey, Armin," Marco said from the bar, pointing at the door, "Your neighbors knocking, looks like he has something to say." Armin turned around, from where he was standing, and peered at the door. Indeed, it was Reiner, standing there and knocking like he had something in his hands.

"I got it," Armin said, hopping down the half-level and walking towards the door. He unlocked it with a click, and opened the door to tell Reiner, "We've got another half hour before we're open, sorry."

Reiner rolled his eyes, and said, "Do I look like I'm here to drink?" He held out his arm to Armin, and Armin realized he was holding a rolled up magazine. "Annie saw this in the market, thought you'd be interested," he said.

Armin unrolled the magazine, and looked at it, his eyes suddenly bulging. There, in the bottom right, was a blurry picture of him. "That... that's me!" he said disbelievingly.

Reiner shrugged. "You gotta come over more. It seems like you're doing some interesting stuff," he snorted to himself. "I'll let you get back to work then."

Reiner shut the door and walked down the street and away, and Armin barely had the faculty to lock the door again and sink down onto the nearest chair, staring at the magazine. Did he even want to read any further than the headline?

"What's that?" Sasha was saying, trying to get up closer. "Whatcha got there, Armin?" She picked up the magazine, and looked at the headline. "Oh wow, it's you!" she said. "Connie, check it out! Armin's famous!"

Connie walked over, quickly flanked by Marco, and the three huddled around the magazine, flipping open to the blurb about Armin, that also contained a fuzzy picture of Eren walking with his arm around Armin. "Geez Armin," Connie said, "Why do you have this? They always say never to read your own press." Sasha laughed, and Connie snickered at his own joke.

"Shut up," Armin moaned, dragging his fingers down his face. "Oh, god, this is going to ruin my life, isn't it?" he said, more into the air than anything else.

"It doesn't have to," Marco said kindly, "just be boring, and then the press will be bored."

"God Armin, stop complaining," Sasha said, sticking her tongue out. "Your famous, and you have a rich boyfriend trying to buy you things all the time. That's like, my dream." She rolled her eyes. "All I've got is Connie!" she said, before kissing Connie on the cheek and flouncing away back to her side work.

Connie in question turned bright red, his eyes bugging out, as Marco and Armin laughed at him.


	11. The Tenderest of Words

**IMPORTANT:** Heed the rating change. Thanks, and I apologize for any inconvenience.

* * *

Armin and Eren had decided to visit on Sundays, because he had the whole day off and he could waste as much time as he liked on Sundays. This Sunday, though, Eren was agitated. He greeted Armin at the door looking nervous, his mind somewhere else.

"Hello," Armin said brightly, hugging Eren at the door. Eren froze for a minute but then hugged Eren in return, and after a second's embrace the two let go, and shut the door and Armin slipped off his shoes in the foyer.

"Let's go upstairs," Eren said, leading Armin towards the staircase, and a little excitement curled in Armin's stomach. He'd never been in the second story of Eren's home before. Eren walked up the staircase quickly, and Armin wished he had a few minutes more to look at the photographs lining it.

They arrived in another hallway, and Eren led him towards at door near the back of the home, and opened it quickly, shutting it after Armin walked in and the lights flickered on on their own.

It was a bedroom. Plush and overdecorated, like every other damn room in this house, but it was still so personal to Eren that Armin felt privileged to be in here. It was not messy like Armin's was, but a painting was covered with a sheet in the corner, the bed unmade with the blankets all over the floor, and a couple books scattered around a coffee table along with a tablet and some magazines near a couch.

"I didn't really want Mikasa to hear me talking about this," Eren sighed in explanation as he walked over and sat on the couch, leaning against one arm of it. Armin copied the movement and leaned against the other, all his attention on Eren as he stared at the brunet. "I'm just... I'm trapped in this stupid company," he complained. "I can't get out, I can't get away from my dad's legacy, they won't let me give the responsibility to somebody else, and all these people I don't know are judging me for it everyday, and saying that if Jaeger Groups continues on the same path the economy is going to get even more messed up, and they all just keep blaming me, and I don't know what to do!" his breath hitched as he got more into it, "And everytime I tell Mikasa how I feel about it, she just says I'm being selfish and that my dad going missing made it hard for everyone but I didn't even like my dad and I have to suck it up and keep working! She doesn't understand!"

"Eren," Armin said softly, "I understand, and I don't. I don't understand how your business works, but I know how it feels to be trapped in a situation you can't get out of."

"It... it stifles me. It's so hard to paint, to do things I love."

"I know, Eren."

And then there was a connection. Somehow, that one thing they had in common made Armin see Eren in a new light. They were the same. They were trapped. But Eren had offered Armin a way out, he'd extended a hand, and all Armin had to do was take it. But Armin had nothing to give Eren. He wouldn't take that hand.

"It sucks," Eren said with some degree of finality.

"I understand. I was graduating high school, but my grandpa was sick, and there was hardly any money in my college fund, so it all just went straight to pay for medical stuff for him, even though it wasn't enough. I'm still paying debt on his bills, and he's dead. There's just... no way for me to ever go to college, really."

"There is a way," Eren said, leaning closer to his boyfriend, kissing his forehead.

"Eren, I don't want that," Armin said, "I don't want our entire... this, to be you giving and me getting. It isn't fair."

Hush, hush, Eren thought, as he leaned over and caught Armin in a kiss, something awaking inside of his gut. Somehow, this felt new, as Armin gripped his shoulders and responded, melting under him. "Eren, no offense," Armin said, suddenly breaking away, "this would be more comfortable on your bed."

Eren smiled and nodded, getting up and gripping Armin's hand, dragging him over towards the bed, and pulling him on top of the plush sheets and suddenly found himself hoping Armin wouldn't think too much of the luxury of it, as he pulled him closer and started making out with the blond again. Armin sighed against him, his grip on Eren's shirt tightening.

Eren pulled away. "I want you," Eren whispered, his breath hot on Armin's skin as they both breathed heavily. A dark flush had covered his cheeks.

"You can have me," Armin replied, despite himself. They hadn't talked about this before, but he was sure Eren had thought about it.

Eren kissed him again, and Armin pulled him closer on top of him, until their bodies were pressed flushed together, he could feel Eren's own breathing against his chest. "Armin, I have to tell you something," Eren said, after he suddenly broke away and looked awkward. "Armin, I, um, I haven't done this before," he finally said.

"You're a virgin?" Armin said bluntly, and Eren blushed. It seemed strange to him that Eren would be a virgin, with all the money and the power in the world, men and women throwing themselves at him left and right, but in some strange way, it also seemed right. Of course Eren was untouched—Eren was too careful with his affection and with his mouth, except for one drunken night at a bar.

"Yeah," Eren said softly. "I'm way too old to be, I know."

"Eren," Armin said, pulling his boyfriend closer again, "there is nothing wrong with you, or who you are." Eren took a quick intake of breath, as Armin trailed his fingers down to his shirt, finally gripping the hem of it and tugging. They shifted and scooted about for a moment for a better position, and Armin finally pulled off Eren's skin, revealing his leaned but toned skin beneath. Armin suddenly paused, and said, "Wait, Eren, do you have lube and condoms?"

"I'm not that innocent..." Eren mumbled, leaning over on the bed towards the stand. He pulled the drawer open and set the tube and the package on the stand, and Armin smiled, taking the opportunity to pull his own shirt off and throw it aside.

Eren gazed at Armin, not quite sure what to do with all this new skin. "You're so thin," he finally said, his thumb ducking into a notch between two ribs. "I want you to gain some weight."

"Shh," Armin replied, pulling Eren closer for another kiss, wrapping his arms around Eren's neck as he opened his mouth.

Armin pushed Eren over onto the pillows so he was over Eren then, and began to kiss down the line of Eren's jaw. Eren wasn't sure what to do with his hands, and settled for keeping them on Armin's hips. He could feel how hard Armin was through their clothes, rubbing on his thigh.

He certainly aware of his own erection too, and how much he wanted Armin to touch it.

Eren moved his hands to hook his fingers under Armin's jeans. Armin paused for the slightest moment, kissing Eren again as Eren moved his fingers again, shakily unbuttoning Armin's jeans and pulling them down along with his underwear. Armin kicked them off, and down the edge of the bed, along with his socks.

Eren found himself pulling Armin over, switching positions yet again. He covered Armin's cock with his hand, pumping slowly and then thumbing the head. Armin gazed at him with half closed eyes. He sighed softly, and then batted Eren's hand away, moving to unzip Eren's jeans as well.

As Eren lost the last of his clothes, Armin murmured, "In me, please," and Eren breathed in sharply, reaching over to grab the tube of lube and somehow felt more nervous than he had even before. In that time, Armin reached over and put a pillow under his ass, and reached up to touch Eren's shoulder, so tender that it somehow relaxed Eren a little. He uncapped the tube and squeezed a little on his fingers, gently prodding at the skin around Armin's hole before he pushed one finger in.

"It's been a while since I've done this," Armin said, his breath catching as Eren started to finger him. Eren tentatively added another finger, glancing at Armin's face shyly as he did so, watching the blond's eyes flutter. Armin shuddered a bit as Eren changed the angle of his fingers a little bit. His prostate, right.

After a moment, he added another finger, watching Armin's reactions, how the blond moved and reacted to his own movements. "Eren, please," Armin finally said, and Eren pulled his fingers out and put on the condom.

They spent a second positioning themselves, Armin wrapping his legs around Eren as Eren spent that last second before on his mental fortification and slid in. He immediately gasped and shut his eyes, before opening them again and looking at Armin, who had the strangest expression on his face. "You're so tight," Eren murmured, moving to kiss Armin's neck.

"Eren," Armin gasped, "move."

So Eren did, starting to gently rock his hips in slow, shallow thrusts, still a little unsure of himself, watching Armin for every minute reaction. It felt so good, but did it for Armin? Oh god, what if Armin didn't like this because of how inexperienced he was...

He picked up his pace a little, starting to breath a bit more quickly as he adjusted his angle a little. Armin suddenly let out a high moan, and it just seemed to fit him so perfectly, and Eren realized the look on his face, his heavy lidded eyes, his mouth hanging half open wasn't strange, it was beautiful.

Armin was just so hot and tight and there and around him, and it was amazing. People said losing their virginity was just something to get over with, but Eren was so glad he'd been so socially awkward and had waited because this was just perfect and oh god he wasn't going to last at all, was he?

He knew he was getting close, his thrusts become a bit more erratic and a bit more uncontrolled, and he knew he wasn't hitting Armin's prostate as much anymore. He could feel sweat collecting where he bent his knees and on his back, and he knew Armin was sweating too.

He cried out as he came into the condom, before Armin finished, gasping for a moment. He didn't quite meet Armin's eyes as he pulled out and took off the condom, tying it off and throwing it in the trash can next to his bed stand.

He laid on his side and started to jerk Armin off, slowly at first and picking up speed. He finally looked back up at Armin, who let out a high gasp as Eren slid his two fingers back into him, still residually wet. It took him a second to find Armin's prostate again, and soon enough the blond was writhing and finally arched his back and came all over Eren's hand and his stomach, and Eren pulled his fingers out again, and let go of Armin's softening cock.

Armin was breathing heavily and he ducked his head under Eren's chin, leaning on his neck and shoulder, and it took him a moment, but the blond finally breathed out, "I love you."

Eren stilled as the magnitude of Armin's words hit him, and he realized how Armin never said anything he didn't mean. Eren smiled and said, "I love you too."

Armin was finally stilling, and smiling as he looked back up at Eren, and said, "Um, do you think you could clean me up?"

Eren blushed and untangled their legs, getting off the bed and going to the bathroom, never so happy to have had a bathroom connected to his room before. He washed his hands quickly, and wetted and grabbed two rags, wetting one a little bit and leaving the other dry. He went back into his bedroom, and quickly cleaned and dried Armin, throwing the two rags across the room in the general vicinity of his laundry basket. He pulled up the comforter and crawled back on the bed with Armin, words escaping him. There was nothing that needed to be said, so he didn't need to put any effort into it, right?

The two tangled their legs together again, and Eren linked his hands with Armin's, staring at the other but slowly nodding off. Armin pressed a kiss to Eren's hand, and said again, "I love you."

* * *

When they both woke up, it was still light out. "Armin, um, was that good for you?" Eren asked once he felt awake enough, looking at the other intently.

"Of course it was," Armin said, "but what I really hope it was was good for you," he said.

"It-it was!"

"I'm glad," Armin said, "My, uh, my first time wasn't that great. I didn't know the girl too well, and I was just at a party and trying to be cool in high school... turned out I was gay and she was a lesbian." Eren could help but snort at the way Armin pursed his lips when he said this. "Do you mind if I take a shower, Eren?" Armin asked.

"'Course not," Eren said. "Use my shampoo and stuff. Let me know if you need help with the knobs. I'll probably take one after..."

Armin smiled, and got up from the bed, walking towards the bathroom door. As soon as he'd disappeared through it, Eren lay flat on his back and let out a heavy sigh.

Wow.

* * *

**A/N: Super big thank you to Jeanine (touch-meh-wife-and-die on tumblr) for looking over sections of this chapter for me! She's a doll and I 3 her.**

**If anyone thinks the sex is bad, flame the fuck outta me. It was necessary but agh. This is my first time writing smut outside of collab, so.**

**Thank you to all of my readers! I love you**


	12. Lies

When Armin went downstairs to go home (he had work in the morning!) he was accosted by Mikasa. In hindsight, he probably should have had some forethought about Mikasa being in the house. Were these walls sound proofed...? He was in the middle of putting on his jacket when she walked into the foyer, and said, "Can I talk to you?"

"Sure," Armin replied easily, taking his jacket and shoes back off and hurrying after Mikasa as she walked into the dining room. The room was in a pleasant state of disarray, papers covering the huge table and hats, jackets, and glove littering the chairs and the floor. It was the messiest Armin had ever seen a room in Eren and Mikasa's home.

"I just wanted to say thank you," Mikasa said sweetly, "You're good for Eren, you really are. And Eren's not an alcoholic."

Armin was about to say thank you, but the end of her sentence left him reeling. "What?" he managed to say. Quite a subject change...

"Well, the night you met Eren he was probably pretty plastered," Mikasa said easily, "and I wanted you to know that he's not an alcoholic, or dependent on it. He was becoming it though, slowly," she said, "Until he met you. He's barely drank a drop since."

Armin thought back to the beer the night at the bar when Eren and Jean had tried to stalk him, and shrugged. Then again, Eren hadn't exactly gotten drunk. "Oh."

"That's what I mean when I say you're good for Eren," Mikasa said sweetly.

"Oh, um, thank you then?" Armin said awkwardly.

"Hurt my brother and I'll break your face," Mikasa said, not to let Armin think she was too soft.

* * *

The automatic emails Mikasa was getting were becoming annoying. Again, and again. _Attempted Credit Fraud – Automatic Notice. _Over fourteen of the messages had arrived in her priority mailbox, one or two a day. You'd think who'd ever gotten ahold of Grisha's credit card would give up, but the notices just kept coming, and the locations of the uses were getting closer, and it made Mikasa uncomfortable. The notices had moved from Mexico, to southern California, and were inching ever eastward, making her extremely uncomfortable.

Eren walked into her study as she gave her laptop a dirty look. "Where is he now?" he asked, seeing the notice on her screen.

Mikasa sighed. "It's polite to knock," she said sternly, "but the last transaction was about two hundred miles south of here. I think its like whoever it is is using the messages to... tell us their progress. They're just coming closer so fast," she said.

"I guess," Eren said. "And they're not big transactions either. It's no more than twenty dollars each time. Have you let anyone around the company know about it?" he asked.

"No, no need to get them all flustered and sticking their noses in our business," she said. "Especially yours," she said, eyeing Eren in a way that made him blush. "Congratulations."

* * *

Mikasa threw a couple of tabloids on Eren's lap when she came home later that evening. Eren looked up from his paper covered tablet in confusion, raising an eyebrow at her.

Wordlessly, Mikasa sat down on the couch, and opened the first tabloid to a page about ten pages inside, pointing at a box and a photograph that took up about half the size of the page. The photograph was blurry, but it the person in it looked eerily like Grisha Jaeger. It was the same hair, the glasses, the same stupid look on his face.

Eren narrowed his eyes and read the mini-article while Mikasa ruffled around in the other magazine. The pages crinkled as he gripped them tighter.

_Grisha Jaeger famously went missing two years ago, sparking one of the largest searches the country has seen in years, leaving his son and adopted daughter behind to pick up the pieces, and the burden of the family-owned mega-company, Jaeger Groups. After Jaeger was declared dead six months later, Eren Jaeger and Mikasa Ackerman inherited a net worth of 10.3 billion dollars from Jaeger. _

_However, over the past week shop owners across America have reported an eerie look alike of Grisha appearing in the shops and using a canceled credit card in Grisha Jaeger's name. The photo above, taken in Atlanta, matches all of the shop keepers descriptions. _

_Jaeger Groups declines to comment on the matter, and states the Eren Jaeger and Mikasa Ackerman were unavailable for comment at the time of publication._

_Is Grisha Jaeger alive? Is it a doppelganger looking for attention? Send us your thoughts and comments online or via snail mail!_

Eren groaned and threw the tabloid on the table, pulling at his hair with his fingers. "God, this stuff with Grisha is a mess," he groans.

"Read this one too," Mikasa said, handing the other tabloid to him. "It looks like we've got a media storm on our hands.

This other article took up a full two pages, mostly of pictures of Armin of varying quality. A picture of him, the dim lighting and the wallpaper signifying the bar taken with what was probably a cell phone camera, others taken on the streets as Armin hurried to and from jobs, one of Armin getting out of a car that Eren knew he owned, with the license plate blurred.

The bit of text read:

_Eren Jaeger's mysterious boyfriend... revealed! _

_Our source, who declines to be named, says that the super rich Eren Jaeger is entertaining a beau by the name of Armin Arlert. Supposedly, Jaeger is lavishing Arlert with attention, and giving the boy lots and lots of gifts._

Eren winced at Armin being referred to as a boy. He probably wouldn't like that.

_Until recently, Arlert was an employee of Jaeger Groups, and worked at a bar in Shinganshina district. However, Arlert's job at Jaeger Groups has apparently been recently terminated in time for him to take a job with close Jaeger family friend, the Kirschteins. _

_"He may just be using Eren for his money, which is what we're all afraid of. We don't want him breaking Eren's heart."_

_At the time of publication, Jaeger Groups stated that Eren is unavailable for comment._

This publication made Eren a lot angrier. Armin was the _opposite _of using Eren for his money, seeing as he'd hardly accept a dollar Eren tried to give him! And it seemed like it was trying to assume Armin was younger than Eren! That would also make Armin mad.

"Looks like we're in a mess," Eren groaned. "Should I offer an exposé or something?"

"You'll have to talk to people in the press department first, for the companies sake," Mikasa said, "and you'll have to actually email your publicist back, for like the first time in a year."

"I don't know what to do," Eren said. "Armin's going to be furious. And he's walking around in public so much, as soon as they figure out where he lives the paparazzi is going to eat him alive..."

"Tell him to move in here," Mikasa said bluntly.

"Mikasa, we're not even nearly that serious!"

"I know," Mikasa said, "but you want him to be safe, don't you?"

* * *

It happened the next morning on Armin's way to work. He already wasn't in the best of his moods, feeling a little tired, and kind of resenting his jobs, because he just wanted to be with Eren. He was approached when he was sitting, waiting for the bus on a bench, surrounded by perfectly respectable other people when someone said to him, "sir, may I ask you a few questions?"

Armin looked up and the guy had a camera slung around his neck, and a maniacal gleam in his eye as he offered Armin a hand. "Um, I'm not sure if I'm comfortable with that," Armin said calmly, but instead of nodding and walking away the guy grabbed his shoulder and pulled him off the bench, and Armin saw the flash of a camera from somewhere behind the man as a few of the people gave murmurs of disapproval.

The guy pulled Armin away, and it was like a team of them swooped out of nowhere, surrounding him on the side walk. The first one to approach him, said in a demanding tone, "Will you please describe the nature of your relationship with Eren Jaeger?"

Stunned, Armin started to stutter out a response, unsure what he was saying anyway, when a woman instead implored of him, "Are you only using Jaeger for his wealth?"

_No! _Armin tried to say it, but it was like it got stuck and died somewhere in his throat as more and more of them jostled him, and took pictures, and he realized, oh, fuck, he'd just missed his bus and why wouldn't they leave him alone?

"Please get off of me," he tried to say calmly, "I'm going to be really late for work already now," he said, feeling the panic rising in him. Oh, god, he hadn't felt this way since high school, this horrible sinking feeling he'd get in his stomach as his thoughts got more and more scrambled and frazzled.

"Why was your job at Jaeger Groups terminated, Mr. Arlert?" somebody else asked as a camera was shoved right in front of his face, and Armin tried to curl up and make himself smaller, but this group of maybe six people surrounding him was so overwhelming and some of them were touching him and other people were staring and oh no oh no oh no.

He'd hardly realized he'd started to cry and hyperventilate, and he'd hardly noticed that the questions had stopped but the camera flashes hadn't until a stranger yelled, "what the hell, get off the guy and get him in a hospital! There's something wrong!"

* * *

**A/N: Sorry for the wait.**


	13. With and Without

EXCLUSIVE EXPOSÉ ON EREN JAEGER'S MYSTERIOUS BOYTOY!

From our sources wishing to remain anonymous:

"Armin isn't stupid, and the rumors that he's only using Eren for his money can be put to rest now. Armin has never been greedy, and he usually refuses gifts from Eren and proposals of lavish dates. He wants to be a normal person."

PROFILE:

Full name: Armin Arlert

Age: 24

Career: Cocktail waiter at the Friendly Tavern in Shiganshina District, former machine operator for Jaeger Inc. Currently interned at Kirschtein Engineering Firm

Family: No siblings. Both parents were dead when Arlert was two, cause of death is disputed. Arlert was raised by his grandfather.

Education: Graduated as Valedictorian from Shiganshina General High School. Arlert did not go on to higher education, but reportedly wishes too.

Why is Jaeger so infatuated with him?

"Nobody can quite figure out what Eren's deal with Arlert is. Arlert pretty much rejected him at the start, but Eren was just fixated and obsessed with him."

"It's really strange to see Armin getting this kind of attention. He's still just one of those people that lives in the same complex as me. But Armin isn't a bad person, and I wish people would stop making him out as some kind of greedy gold digger."

* * *

"Please, ma'am, just let me see him!" Eren pleaded with the receptionist, his hands balled into fists, clenched so tight his skin was turning white at the knuckles. "I have to know he's alright!"

"I'm sorry Mr. Jaeger," the receptionist said, her placard reading 'Riko'. "I can only allow a spouse or other legal relation to visit Mr. Arlert before he wakes up. Once Mr. Arlert wakes up from the sedatives, he can approve your visit."

"Eren, come on, let's sit down," Mikasa said, "Armin's going to be just fine, there is nothing for us to worry about."

Eren grumbled under his breath, but he did not really reply. Mikasa grabbed his wrist, and pulled him back to the uncomfortable chairs that lined the hospital lobby. Eren bounced his leg as they sat there, trying to will the time to past faster.

They had refused to tell Eren and Mikasa anything of Armin's condition. They'd only known to come when Jean said that Armin hadn't showned up at his firm and had apparently been admitted to the hospital.

Mikasa looked at her phone. Eren sat.

He couldn't figure out how long they sat there, but it couldn't have been as long as he felt it was, when a nurse in scrubs arrived from the elevator and spoke quietly with the receptionist for a moment, before walking over to Mikasa and Eren.

"Hi, are you two Mikasa Ackerman and Eren Jaeger?" she asked.

"Yes!" Eren said, a bit forcefully for the situation. He immediately straightened up in his chair as Mikasa put her phone away glumly.

"Alright," the nurse said, "Mr. Arlert has awoken and approved your visit. I'll take you to him now, if that's convenient."

They got up and started following the nurse down the hall. Mikasa asked, "Is Armin going to be alright?"

"He'll be just fine," the nurse said. "He suffered from a panic attack and had to be sedated for his and other's safety, that is all."

She took them up two levels of the building, and led them inside a tiny little room. There was a window, but the shades in it were pulled. Armin was sat on the bed, with his knees pulled up. He was looking at a book, which Eren then realized was a bible. Armin looked bored, but when he registered them walking into the room he put down the book and his face immediately lit up.

"Armin, are you okay?" Mikasa asked as Eren immediately crossed the room and enveloped his boyfriend in a tight hug.

"Yeah, I was just really scared," Armin said. He noticed the nurse leaving the room to give them privacy.

"Who was scaring you?" Eren asked, loosening his hold on Armin and taking his hand instead as he sat down on the uncomfortable chair on that side of Armin's bed. Mikasa took the other one.

"Well, eh, there were some paparazzi, I guess, and they were just all over me. I freaked out," he said, downplaying the issue. Would this really be what his life would be like if he stayed with Eren?

"Armin," Mikasa said, an urgency in her voice, "They used to swarm me too, when Grisha first took me in, and I was just a little girl. It's horrible, but when the pictures stop selling they'll stop being interested. It's not going to last forever, I swear."

"It was just really scary," Armin said, "They were asking me all these questions I didn't have the answers to and they kept getting closer to me, and I just wanted to go to work."

"It's messed up that they do that," Eren agreed sadly, "but when they lifted all those privacy laws fifty years ago, they got the rights to do that to people without getting in trouble."

"Stupid," Armin muttered.

* * *

mirarararara: #ArminArlert ughhhh sounds like such a gold digger

theonly1me: #ArminArlert little bitch is gonna break eren's heart

JuneBeloved4: mirarararara omfg I know right? pfft look at his stupid baby boy face ugh

coffeeprincess: #ArminArlert ErenJaegerOfficial is gay? wah #disappointed

kittyface: coffeeprincess um are you sure #ArminArlert isn't a girl I mean look at him

coffeeprincess: kittyface hahaha truuuu

* * *

"Eren, you're not paying my hospital bills," Armin said when they came back to visit the next day. Eren had just proposed the idea, and as of course, Armin was not pleased with it. Honestly, Armin just wanted to get out of the hospital in general.

"Yes I am," Eren insisted. Mikasa watched them both with scrutiny. They always fought over money, and she found it boring.

"Eren, I have insurance!" Armin protested, "I pay it every month, let it come in useful for once! I worked hard to get it." He crossed his arms, and subconsciously turned hiss body away from Eren.

"Armin, please," Eren pleaded, "it's kind of my fault you're in here at all."

Armin still staunchly refused. Mikasa rolled her eyes. "Armin, just let us pay it," she said, "it'll be easier."

Armin melted a little, glancing at the woman who only gave him her usual cold, calculating look. "Fine," he gave in, "but don't think I'm happy about this," he said.

"How come he listens to you and I can't even buy him a present?" Eren said bitterly to Mikasa.

* * *

With Armin out of the hospital, Mikasa checked on the finances. Sure, they had an accountant for this job, but she still liked to keep a handle on them herself at times, she wanted to know what was going on.

She recognized all the charges. No matter how much it fussed Armin up, his hospital stay was far from the largest charge on there. Money came in from the company as normal, and still, there were those annoying credit card notices.

Mikasa sighed, looking through the charts and biting her lip. The latest one, having arrived that morning, was a charge a city a half hour away from home. It was far too close.

Hesitantly, Mikasa signed out of her account on the laptop, and instead typed in the account for Grisha's account, which had been left be. Instead of getting a new laptop when her old one had died, she had taken Grisha's after he went missing, but she left his files intact. Some had been deleted or moved around by law enforcement, but she had no control over that. They had had a search warrant to go through Grisha's documents, ("to find out if he disappeared purposefully and had a destination" they had said) so they had.

She ignored company pages, and instead pulled open the web browser, which opened up to the company login page. She quickly typed in his email client instead, and was pleased to discover that the password was still saved in the computer.

For such a brilliant man, Grisha had always been rather lax in his online security, Mikasa mused. Then again, even though the internet had been a thing for a hundred years, it still felt like people, and the whole world, were just trying to get used to it.

She frowned, clicking into his high-priority mail box. There were messages received in the last week, that had been opened and read over.

She clicked into the sent box, and opened the most recently sent one, from yesterday morning.

She read the first line: "_I will be in Fort Maria within the week_"

* * *

Armin had been excited to get back to his internship. However, instead of doing his regular assortment of oddjobs, today he found himself seated at the table in Jean's office, Eren and Jean occupying the other two seats with serious looks on their faces.

"Hi Armin, are you glad to be back?" Jean asked politely.

"I am, but I'm not sure why I'm sitting here and not brewing coffee," Armin told him, raising an eyebrow at the two.

"Oh, let's cut to the chase," Eren said, rolling his eyes. Jean would talk pleasanteries all day if you let him, Eren had always thought, and he wouldn't get anything done at all unless you prodded him relentlessly. Jean had always though Eren insensitive and rude.

"What's going on?" Armin asked, squirming his legs a little under the table, where the other two couldn't see his nervousness.

"We want to encourage you to leave your job at the bar in Shiganshina," Jean said, watching Armin carefully for whatever his reaction may be.

"It's not safe anymore," Eren added.

"I need my job at the bar," Armin said, with an edge of finality, "This internship is great and extremely generous, but I still need a second job to cover my expenses."

"Why won't you let me pay?" Eren asked, the familiar frustration knitting over his features. Did Armin not trust him...? He wanted to provide for his loved one, why did Armin so fiercely resist?

"I don't want to dependent on anyone," Armin said, "I haven't been since Grandpa died, and to be honest, I love you Eren, but I'm not keen on being dependent until we have some level of commitment, and I can at least bring in some income for us, together. I don't want to be a trophy husband."

A sharp reply flitted over Jean's tongue, but he did not give it voice. Instead, he said, "Armin, we just want you to think it through. The bar job could become dangerous, just because its a public place. People could use it to stalk you and to invade your privacy, that is all."

Armin wrinkled his nose. "I'll be fine. I just didn't know what was happening the first time. I'm sorry, but I'm keeping my job. Besides, don't you and Marco need me to swap gossip back and forth for you two?"

Jean blushed. Eren groaned. Jean said, "Tonight, tell him I had a lovely time last night, and look forward to Thursday, then." Armin nodded.

* * *

It was his night off from the bar, and it was the last day of the month. Armin sighed when he found the familiar green envelope in his mailbox in the lobby. He picked it up, and didn't open it until he got back inside his own apartment.

He took the letter opener out of the kitchen cupboard, and fished out a pen, testing it on a receipt from a fast food joint that none of his friends would approve of. With his tools in hand, and a calculator, he sat down at his kitchen table and carefully sliced the envelope open, unfolding the papers, to survey the damages.

Something was wrong.

He frowned, seeing that the "Due" column said "$0.00". That would mean that the bill had already been paid, but he had turned his autopay off six months ago, when he'd had to rebuild his finances again.

He thought of going to the convenience store down the street and buying a six pack, but then shook the thought out of his head. He had to get to the bottom of this.

Otherwise, the numbers looked normal for his rent. Sighing, he picked up the phone and dialed his landlord's number.

"Hello?"

"Hi Mike, it's Armin Arlert. Appartment 4C?"

"Ah, yes, hello. Can I help you? Is anything broken?"

"Well, I have my rent bills in front of me, and it says they were already paid, and I was wondering if you knew anything about this?" he asked politely.

"I was notified by the bank about, eh, two weeks ago, and they said that you'd been put back on autopay. Is there an issue?"

"Well, I didn't turn on autopay..." Armin trailed off, rubbing his temples. Anyone else would think that this was the opposite of a problem, but this had a certain someone's name all over it.

"I'm sorry, but I can't help you anymore Armin," his landlord said, "You're going to have to contact the bank."

"Alright, thank you," Armin said. "Bye."

"Bye." He ended the call, and stared at the phone again in his hand again for a moment, trying not to pull his hair out. After a moment, when he felt a bit calmer, he dialed again.

"Hello, this is Fort Maria City Bank, can I help you?"

"Hi, my name is Armin Arlert, I have some questions about my autopay for my rent?"

"Of course, can you tell me your account number please?"

"Can you just give me a moment to find it?" he asked, getting up and rifling through the cupboard, before pulling out the slip of paper which he'd tucked into a protective sleeve. He read out the number slowly.

He could hear the tap of a keyboard through the other end of the line. "Alright, I have your account information, what do you need to know, exactly?"

"What is the arrangement for the autopay on my account right now?"

The sound of typing again. "Well, sir, it appears that autopay in your name is set up, but instead of the money being taken from your account with us, it redirects to the account of Grisha Jaeger's Estate. Our files say that you approved these transactions, Mr. Arlert. Would you like to change this?"

Armin swallowed. "Not right now," he said after a moment. "I'll call again in the next few days."

"Alright, Mr. Arlert," the voice over the phone said again. "Have a nice day."

"Have a good evening," Armin said, hitting the end call buttom, his hand crashing down to the table, the other curling into a fist.

How—how dare he?! Eren should have known that Armin wasn't comfortable with this... He was twenty-four, dammit, and maybe he didn't inherit a couple billion dollars from his family but he could definitely provide for himself!

A storm brewing in his mind, Armin put his boots and coat on, and hopped on a bus to Sina Heights.

* * *

When he found himself on Eren and Mikasa's doorstep, he pressed the doorbell furiously, until Mikasa arrived at the door, her hair a mess and her looking a bit miffed. "Armin, hi! I thougt you weren't coming by this evening?" she greeted warmly.

"I need to talk to Eren," he said in a hard voice.

Mikasa nearly jumped—she'd never heard Armin using that sort of tone before. It was unlike him, but instead, she just said, "he's in his study."

Well, Eren had definitely done something.

The blonde walked confidently into the study, where he found Eren reading stuff on his laptop. The brunette was surprised to see Armin there, and he immediately shut the laptop and said, "hi Armin!"

He wasn't expecting to receive a slap across the face. To be honest, Armin hadn't been expecting to give it, but seeing that smiling face, something inside him had just snapped. The crack of skin on skin resonated in the dead air for a second, and the two stared at each other. Armin's hand burned, and so did Eren's cheek.

"So," Armin said coldly, "what am I supposed to be to you?"

"You're my boyfriend," Eren said slowly, feeling confused, and hurt, "and I love you," he finished.

"Then why am I your project?" Armin said. "I know about the bills, Eren, I'm not stupid, I sat down to pay my rent, and they decide to tell me that I'm not paying my own bills? You are? Is this some kind of joke? Are you trying to pay to fuck me or something? I don't even know what to think anymore."

Eren reeled. No, no, no, it wasn't supposed to be like this, Armin wasn't supposed to be angry at him. It hurt, it hurt so bad. "Armin, you weren't supposed to—"

"I wasn't supposed to what?" Armin said, "Find out? Want to be independent from you, my own person?"

"No, I wasn't saying that! Let me talk!" Eren protested.

"No!" Armin said, "I've let you talk, and it's about time you started listening to me for once!" his cheeks burned as he spoke. He wasn't sure if he was speaking or yelling anymore. "I want to be seperate, I want to be independent, I don't want to be your toy," he stressed.

Something inside Eren broke, but he let Armin keep speaking.

"But most of all, what I need, is to be in control." Armin said, trying not to grit his teeth as he stared at Eren, not even sure what to feel anymore. "You're taking my control away," he said, "and through trial and error, I've learned that when I don't have control, I tend to fall apart."

He glared at Eren. He didn't know what this was anymore. Eren looked so hurt, but Eren needed to learn. He had overstepped so many boundaries, perhaps this was due after all.

"I'd tell you about it," Armin said, "but you'd probably just try to buy me more counseling."

* * *

**A/N: I am sorry for the lack of updates over the past two weeks. School is very busy for me right now as I am studying Trigonometry independently, and will be skipping my Junior year next fall, so suddenly all these things that were a year away need to be done right now. Sadly, this means that sometimes there is just no energy to write a story. Updates will probably slow down as they did this update, but I am still here, even if my readers aren't!**


	14. Warm Welcome

It felt like every minute of the day, Armin's phone was ringing. Eren knew his schedule, and when he was at home the land line was going, and when he was out his cell phone was vibrating. It was irritating. His inbox was full of unopened text messages.

He set his phone away in the server's station, and sighed. Marco smiled at him warmly whilst he tied the apron around his hips. Connie and Sasha had rigged the stereo system to play some trendy pop artist, and they were dancing wildly in one of the corners. Everything was technically ready to open, and usually Marco would be shutting Connie and Sasha down and finding them something to clean before he unlocked the door, but instead he was staring at Armin.

Armin fidgeted and adjusted his apron, before he walked up to the bar and leaned against it. "Jean wants me to tell you that Eren's a mess." he said pleasantly.

"Eren can suck it," Armin bit out, scowling.

Marco laughed, tapping his fingers on the bar to the upbeat song that was playing over the stereo. "I really think you should talk it out with him, set better boundaries. Make up," he said.

"I don't want to," Armin said, "He violated my trust and went behind my back, and that isn't okay. He's too used to getting what he wants. Maybe its about time he didn't."

"Well, I can just tell that it's tearing you up too," Marco said, and Armin didn't have a response to that. Instead, he walked away and switched out the music for their usual soft rock.

"Come on Armin," Sasha said, "Just 'cause you're moping doesn't mean we all have to be pissy! Lighten up!"

"Nah, he's right," Marco said, "We should probably open up now."

He unlocked the door and they all got to making it look like they were busy and doing their jobs, a steady flow of customers starting to filter in. It was a Saturday night, after all. There were some small groups and some big groups that Armin served, but none were particularly interesting for the first couple of hours.

Around eight, his neighbors all filtered in, looking weary and worn out. They plopped themselves at their favorite table in front of the window, and he walked over and flipped open his notepads.

"Hi Reiner, Bertholdt, Annie!" he greeted brightly, settling his weight on his right foot. "What can I get you?"

Annie lifted an eyebrow, and exchanged a look with the rest of them. "We want Bud," she said, "but we also wanted to tell you that they made up celebrities too. They're all over us trying to get us to say stuff about you."

"Uh huh..." Armin said, his mood falling a bit. All the stuff he'd seen on social media about him being a whore and a gold digger was getting to him, a little. He scribbled down the order. "What do you mean?"

"Annie means that all these paparazzi types are harassing us trying to get us to talk about you," Reiner said, shifting in his seat and tapping his fingers on the table.

Bertholdt said quietly, "We said good things."

Armin pressed his lips together, and said finally, "Well, thanks for defending my honor. I'll go get your beers."

He went back to work, chatting brightly with his neighbors when he brought them their drinks or whisked away their empties.

Connie, meanwhile, was tired, and really, really didn't want to be working that night. He had a video game to finish that night, dammit, and he thought he might be getting a cold! But no, nope, needed the money.

He slapped his thigh to the beat of the song over the stereo whilst standing at the cash register behind the bar, out of customer's view, punching in the numbers. He swore when he got one of the drinks wrong, going through the tedious process of removing it from the customers bill.

He was kind of bad at staying on top of his orders, to be honest. He tended to ask Marco for the drinks and then punch in the drinks for all his tables at once every half an hour. He had to get to doing this right sometime. He probably would after he eventually got in trouble for it.

He flipped his notepad shut and closed out of his account, stepping out and looking over the tables at the bar. He saw a table with a few empties sitting there, with a man and a woman looking engrossed in conversation.

The woman was fiddling with her phone as the man talked to her, her tongue sticking out a bit between her lips. It seemed like she was minutely changing the angle. It was odd, and Connie decided to brush it off for now.

He walked closer, noting that this was one of Sasha's tables. Armin was standing at the table next door, telling them about some of the specials Marco was making that weekend.

Connie stood next to the woman and started to pick the empties off of the table, before noticing what was on her phone. She was trying to get the screen to focus, and was snapping picture after picture... of Armin!

A bit of red flashed across his mind as Connie got angry. Sure he sometimes didn't get along with Armin, but he was his friend, dammit, and this lady was violating his privacy. "Hey!" Connie said, snatching the phone out of her hands, "you can't do that, you can't take pictures of someone without them knowing, this is a private establishment!"

Hearing the commotion Connie was making as the man and the woman started to argue with him, the woman making grabby hands at her phone as Connie held it behind him, Armin stopped talking and looked over. "I'm sorry, I'll be back in a moment," he said.

The bar was starting to fall silent as Sasha walked over too, and everyone stared at Connie and the two patrons. "Give me that," the woman was saying, "I'll report you for theft!"

"After Armin sees this!" Connie argued, thrusting the phone into Armin's hands, which was still opened to the woman's camera. "Look at what she was doing, Armin!"

Marco strode over as Armin shakily clicked into the woman's photo album. There it was, she must have taken over fifty pictures of him! His cheeks reddened as he scrolled through them, before he started to highlight them all, and clicked delete. He calmly set it down on the table, before walking away and shutting himself in the cleaning supply closet.

Marco looked between the patrons and Connie, and sighed. "Ma'am, sir, he is right, and we're going to have to ask you to leave, for violating Mr. Arlert's privacy. Sasha will bring you your bill. We're, ah, sorry for the scene." He turned away and grabbed Connie's arm, pulling him into the back.

"Come on!" Connie said, when they were out of the view of peering eyes, "What she was doing wasn't okay, and you know it!"

"I know that, but you taking a customer's possession and causing a scene, instead of telling me what she was doing so I could take care of it also wasn't okay, Connie," Marco said, trying to calm him down. "Look, I don't want to, but I gotta tell my uncle about this. And you should probably go home for the night, okay? I'll call in Mina."

Connie stewed, but Marco walked away from him. He had to talk to his other waiter, who was probably crying in the closet, and get Mina to come in. He called in Mina first, who thankfully agreed to come in for the rest of Connie's shift.

He steeled himself as he opened the closet door, and as he predicted, Armin was a mess, heavy sobs wracking his body even though he wasn't crying any tears. "I just want them to leave me alone!" he moaned as Marco walked in. Marco locked the door behind himself, and sat down on one of the spare barstools, next to Armin. He awkwardly patted Armin's shoulder, not sure how to deal with this mess.

"I can't say I understand, Armin," Marco said, biting his lip. "Do you want a hug?"

"That," Armin said, calming down a little bit, "Actually sounds really nice right now." He threw his arms around Marcom and Marco squeezed him tightly, feeling Armin's panicked breathing against his body.

Armin really deserved none of this, Marco thought. "What are you thinking?" he asked.

"Trying to convince myself not to pay you for a drink," he said, still not letting go.

Marco held onto him for a moment longer, before gently seperating from Armin, and asking, "Do you want me to call in Thomas for you, and send you home?"

"That'd be good, yeah," Armin said.

"Okay," Marco said, "Let's get out of the closet now, alright?"

He led Armin out, and found one of his neighbors hanging around outside of the closet. Reiner, he thought. He said, "Here's our card, get our bill paid and we'll get him home, alright? We'll look after him." He held out his credit card.

"Alright," Marco said taking the card and walking to the register. Poor thing.

* * *

Eren was a mess, and Mikasa was honestly getting a bit tired of dealing with it. He sat at the kitchen table, staring off into space as she cooked the pasta, the timer counting down. One minute to go. She watched him while she stirred the contents of the pot, before the alarm went off. She turned off the stove top and took an oven mitt, picking up the pot and dumping the food into the strainer.

Eren perked up a little at the sound, but still made no move to actually help with putting a meal on the table. Mikasa sighed. "Eren, will you fill up someglasses of water, please?" She asked, like he was a child.

Eren nodded and went to do so mechanically. After the initial crying jag once Armin had left, except for trying to call Armin, Eren had been quiet, and mostly still. Mikasa was just trying to make sure he ate. It kind of reminded her of how empty Eren seemed before he'd ever met Armin.

Then, as she mixed the pasta with the butter, the door bell rang. She could see the look that crossed Eren's face, his impossible hope that it was Armin. She shut that down. "I'll get the door," she said, sailing past him and walking into the foyer.

She opened the door, and there stood her godfather.

She stared at him for a moment, going slack jawed. He smiled, his hair long and slightly greasy. His clothes were threadbare, his skin was sallow. "Hello, Mikasa," Grisha Jaeger said, "You're still so very beautiful, aren't you?"

"Who's there?" Eren was saying, his voice sounding cracked. He came around the corner, and saw Grisha standing in the door. "Dad?" he said, his eyes widening.

"My son," Grisha said, a smile settling on his face. "Give me a hug, would you?" he said, stepping across the threshold without being invited in.

"I-I guess," Eren said, his father settling his arms around him as Eren trembled, unsure how to react to this.

"Um, how about we going into the kitchen?" Mikasa said, as Grisha let go of Eren. Damage control, damage control, she chanted to herself. "Eren and I were about to eat dinner, we'll ah, we'll give you some food. You look thin."

She squashed her own feelings of shock as Eren and Grisha sat down, Grisha taking the seat that Armin had been inhabiting these past few months. She filled up another glass of water and set it in front of him, along with another bowl, before she put the serving bowl down on the center of the table along with spoon.

Dinner was a predictably stifled affair, with Grisha trying to get Mikasa and Eren to tell him about their lives, with the two staunchly refusing to give any real information.

"I paint again," Eren suddenly said after a while, his food lying mostly uneaten in front of him.

Grisha's lips thinned as he stared at his son. "Still not using those engineering skills I spent so much money giving you," Grisha grumbled to his son, "wasteful."

"Wasteful," Mikasa broke in, "is leaving your family for two years and coming back, uninvited." Grisha dropped his fork.

"Well, then, I know when I'm not wanted at the table," Grisha said simply as Eren sat and stared at the table. Grisha got up and walked away, up the stairs.

"It's a good thing we didn't take apart his room," Eren said, and Mikasa could help but guffaw.

* * *

Eren stomped around his room, not caring if Mikasa and that man could hear him—he wasn't quite sure he could really call him dad anymore, not if he just disappeared like that—not if he'd spoken to Eren like that, after two years being missing.

He turned to the closet, and opened it. There sat the unfinished canvas—he'd been too afraid these last few days to even open it. His portrait of Armin. The one he didn't even know about, the portrait of Armin that was supposed to be a surprise.

He picked it up and walked down the stairs, rifling in the cupboard of the kitchen until he found the lighter, which he gripped tight in his hand.

"Eren, what are you doing?" Mikasa asked, appearing in the door. But he didn't answer, he only pushed past her and walked down the hall, out into their backyard.

He vaguely registered Grisha following them too, looking worried but curious.

He followed Mikasa onto the patio, "what is he doing?" he asked.

Eren stood there, in the middle of the backyard, both items in his hands. He stared up at the stars. Mikasa did not answer Grisha, only shushed him.

Suddenly, Eren moved, thrusting the canvas on the ground. The wood in it broke with the amount of force he used, bending the canvas to an unrecognizable degree.

It felt like his whole body was shaking, as he held the lighter in front of his face. He flicked it, and watch the flame blossom. He couldn't decide what he wanted to burn more, the painting or Grisha. Finally, he bent down and set the painting ablaze, shaking as he back away.

Grisha walked up to his son, and put a hand on his back. "It's good you do that, son," he said quietly.

Eren had never seen such rage on Mikasa's face until he saw her punch Grisha in the face for that.

* * *

**A/N: My babies.**


	15. Touchable

Mikasa's fingered hovered over the call button, wondering if interfering was really going to be a good idea. But what was there for her to do? Eren was a mess, and who knew how Armin was doing? Jean said he'd left the bar in tears the other night.

Would it be the preferable option, to beg Armin for help? What would he think.

It was time, she had to take the plunge. Eren hadn't eaten in two days, she didn't know if Grisha was about to take away all their money, and possibly their home. She didn't know if Armin was going to be okay. Mikasa hated to say it, but she could take this one alone.

She sighed, and pressed the button.

The phone rang, and rang, for a few minutes, and she realized that it was about to cut to voice mail, when the tone changed and Armin's voice filled her ear, sounding a little bit out of breath, as if he'd ran to get to phone. "Hello?" he asked.

"Hi Armin," she said, "It's Mikasa."

"I know," he said, "Could you um, I don't want to be rude, spit it out? I have to get to the bar soon."

"Look," she said, "I'll pay you double what you'd make tonight. Just get over here, and help me, please. Eren won't eat, and nothing that used to work on him is. Grisha came, and he left, on top of everything with you. Just talk it out with him. You don't have to get back together. Just please, help me."

Armin took a deep breath, and she could hear him shifting the phone in his hands. "I—I don't know," he said.

"Please, I'll do anything," Mikasa pleaded, pacing around her office as she said it. She'd have to drag him into a hospital if he wouldn't snap out of it. Grisha. Fucking Grisha. Mikasa could ease Eren through a break up—but fucking Grisha—pushing him over the edge with his stupid overbearing presence...

Finally, Armin's voice again, distorted by wires and distance and signals. "Fine," he said, "I'll come, and talk to him. Nothing about forgiveness, though."

Mikasa tried to thank him, but the only thing she got in return was a click and a dial tone.

* * *

Armin found himself sitting on the bus, wondering why he was doing this, as he stared at his knees. He'd called Marco, said it was important. Marco had said, "take all the time you need."

Was it really all that important? Did he even really want to go see Eren, see that person who loved him, but also saw him as pitiful, just because of who his parents were, and the school he went to? Armin resented that.

The bus pulled to a stop, and he got off, calling Mikasa through the phone outside the gated complex, who insisted on having him wait for someone to drive down and get him. The gate opened though, and he sat on the bench inside, crossing his ankles.

He was surprised to see her behind the wheel of the car, immaculate and clean as always, a serious expression smoothing out the lines of her face. People were supposed to look younger when they smiled, but Armin had always thought she'd looked younger when she frowned.

"Thank you," Mikasa said, once he'd buckled his seat belt. She turned around, and sped for the house. Armin gripped the door a little bit, watching her out of the corner of his eye. Mikasa was a bit of a scary driver, he decided, but perhaps it was only in the situation.

"You're welcome," he said, even though it was an awkwardly late response.

They arrived at the house, pulling into the garage. "He's in his room," Mikasa said, "That's where I put him, before I left, anyway."

Armin nodded and got out of the car, walking into the house and quickly ascending up the stair case, following the familiar path to Eren's room. He stood outside the room for a moment, trying to calm his nerves a bit. It was just Eren. He was only here to get him to snap out of it. To get over him.

He carefully pushed the door open, and walked through, closing the door behind him. The room was in disarray, things scattered everywhere. There was a lump on the bed, wrapped up in the comforter so nothing could be seen.

"Get out, Mikasa," the lump said, stretching the word out into several syllables.

"It's not Mikasa," Armin said, "It's me." The lump shifted a moment, pulling off the comforter and sitting up. Eren's hair was a mess, and his shirt was a bit disheveled, and ew, when was the last time he took a shower and shaved? "Mikasa wanted me to talk to you," Armin said, walking closer to the bed.

"Armin?" Eren said, as if unbelieving that he was there. Armin sat down on the edge of the bed, and Eren reached out hesitantly, touching his cheek. Armin tried not to flinch, it would not help the situation. But, he did not blush, he did not smile, he did not lean into the touch or any of those things he always did. "Why did Mikasa want you here?"

"She said you wouldn't eat, or do anything," Armin said, looking at Eren.

Honestly, he looked pitiful. Armin had a startling flashback to that first night at the bar, how honestly pathetic Eren had looked then, drunk and sad. But Eren had still had the audacity to give him his last name, and his address. Eren had the audacity to do nothing now, it seemed.

"I did a painting of you," Eren said. Armin froze. Perhaps he had audacity after all. "But then dad came. And I was so angry, Armin. He made me so mad. I was so angry about everything... I just, I took the painting outside and broke the canvas frame, and I set it on fire." He looked sad, picking at the sheets. "Dad praised me for it. But I'm mad I did it. I wanted to give it to you. You probably wouldn't want in now though, anyways." He licked his lips, and stopped speaking, choosing to look away from Armin, and towards the window instead.

"Your dad came back?" Armin said gently. Mikasa hadn't given him any details. It didn't feel real. Grisha Jaeger was dead, and had been for two years. Right?

"He showed up the other night. Just barged in the door," Eren said. "Ate dinner with us, sat in your chair. Yelled at me for not being an engineer. Smiled when I set you on fire. Mikasa punched him in the face. He's at Nile Dawk's now, I think." Armin softened. Eren just looked... defeated. Angry. Armin looked around the room again, and saw brushes and bottles of paint strewn around, along with clothes and paper and trashed. "You know," Eren said, "I want a dog. I should get a dog."

Armin couldn't help but smile a little. He looked down at his knees again. He couldn't think of what to say anymore.

Eren said it for him. "Stop looking down and hunching your shoulders," Eren said, grabbing his wrist. "Making yourself look small. You know, I don't like it when you do that. You have no reason to."

Armin couldn't help but stare at him, and before he knew it words were tumbling out of his mouth. "The other night, I was at the bar, and Connie caught this woman taking pictures of me. I freaked out and ended up going home."

And for once, Eren didn't say anything about wishing Armin didn't work at the bar. Instead, he said, "I'm sorry. It's all my fault this stuff is happening to you." He looked out the window, and said, "I didn't deserve you. You're so hard working and optimistic and grounded—and the only thing I ever had going for me was my last name. Who was I, trying to fix you and make your life perfect?"

Armin closed his eyes for a second, and thought. Did he want to tell Eren this? "Eren, I'm not anything close to perfect or even all that happy," he said. He bit the bullet. "Eren, until about a year ago, I was a mess. I used to have more money than I do now, I wasn't rich, but it was enough. I got a substantial inheritance, when my parents died. Grandpa put it away. But I got it when I was eighteen. But you know what I did with it? I drank it." He stiffened. "I lied to you a bit about it. I lie to myself a bit about it, too, I like to forget about it. Forget I was an alcoholic, forget I did hard drugs. Forget I started because I thought it was sad and it would make me better."

He glanced at Eren. Eren was fixated upon him, so Armin kept talking. "And Grandpa died, and I was the biggest mess. I looked nothing like I do now. I was tired and pale and cranky all the time. I used to yell at Grandpa, and he took it. But after he died, I just partied harder. I didn't have a job then. I just used the inheritance money for everything, and I only got deeper in it when it started to run out. I showed up at the neighbors' one night, so pumped with a synthetic drug cocktail I could hardly do anything. I was trying to get into their apartment, thinking it was mine. Reiner came to the door, and carted me off to rehab. The last of my inheritance paid for it, and I had to get to work immediately after. This was a year before I met you." Eren was still quiet, and Armin bit his lip, and looked at him again, before taking Eren's hand off his wrist, and squeezing it instead. "There, we both fucked up."

But Armin couldn't decide if he forgave him.

He smiled, though, when Eren said, "I'm glad you got past that."

They sat there, for a while longer, and Armin couldn't bring himself to leave to go to work.

* * *

Grisha sat in the leather arm chair, tapping his fingers on the arm as he heard the ring through the phone.

"Hello, this is Jaeger Inc., Erwin Smith speaking."

Grisha smiled into the phone, and said, "I'm alive."

* * *

GRISHA JAEGER LIVES!

Jaeger Inc. announced last night that Grisha Jaeger has returned! Announced dead, Jaeger returned to Fort Maria several nights ago, and is now back to take over his company again. Reportedly not on speaking terms with his son or goddaughter, will the two lose their inheritance and house? Wait on for further developments!

* * *

**A/N: Hi all! So so so sorry for the delay! :( **

**My dear friend Cow has drawn art for You Are Not! It can be found on her tumblr, her url is "secretcow". Ah, just look at it, it's so beautiful. Oh my god. Go like it, reblog it, and follow Cow because it's beautiful and I love Cow. Oh god, look at it. Look at Eren's eyes, the way the sun hits Eren's hair, the sky through the window, the style of Eren's painting. This chapter is also dedicated to Cow, because without it I wouldn't have sat my ass down and finally finished it!**


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